No. 47.— 1896.] CAPTURE OF last kandyan king. Ill 



like head-severed fowls, I posted myself with my 

 two men silently outside the door, and said, " Ammaydru, 

 ingdle ivdngo ; payapudawdndam " (Madams, don't be 

 afraid, come here"). The two queens came towards me, and 

 fell upon my shoulders and cried out, " help us !" In 

 a few seconds I found my clothes stained with blood, and 

 on turning round to see how it came about I found the 

 queens had their ears torn, and the blood dropped from the 

 wounds caused by the wrenching of the gems they had worn. 

 During this awful commotion I got Imbulanwela Arachchi 

 to fetch some medicinal leaves, and pounding them to a 

 pulp applied it to staunch the bleeding. A little while after 

 Ekneligoda Mohottala forced the king out of the house* 

 and behaved very insolently towards him, addressing him 

 with such contemptuous phrases as, " Come, fellow, let me 

 take you to your father " (meaning the English). Whereupon 

 the king said, " If you want to kill me, kill me, or do anything 

 else you please, but I can't go on foot." While Ekneligoda 

 was preparing to tie up the king, saying, " Fetch kirindi 

 creepers to tie up this fellow and take him like a hog," I 

 addressed the Mohottala and .said, " Nilame, you Kandy ans 

 have been up to this hour reverencing the king in such 

 humiliating formsf as worshipping and prostrating your- 

 selves before him, and calling him by such venerable 

 appellations as God, Lord, Father. But as we, 

 from the time of our forefathers, have been the subjects of 

 foreign powers, we do not owe any allegiance to his majesty. 



* This house where the king- was found concealed was occupied by a 

 Kandyan peasant named Udapitiy e Grammahe. It was situated at the village 

 Bomura, between Urugala and Medamahanuwara, in the district of Uda 

 Dumbara, in the Central Province. 



f The king, says Robert Knox, was approached with the profoundest 

 submission imaginable. When addressing his majesty the words Deiyan 

 Buddutrenda, " lord, who art to attain Buddhahood," were used, and 

 the speaker humiliated himself to such a contemptibly low form as that of 

 a Balugetta (a puppy). The Kandyans seemed to think that the king 

 was a supernatural god and brother of the sun and moon, and descended 

 from the sun himself. When he passed by every mortal should be a 

 hundred fathoms off his presence. 



