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JOURNAL, B.A.S. (CEYLON). [VOL. XIX 



himself) will realize that the case is quite otherwise. No one at 

 least can say that the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 

 has not done good work and deserved well of the intelligent public 

 of Ceylon in the past. How it has forged ahead may be judged 

 from the fact of its commencing sixty-one years ago with a roll of 

 thirty-four Members, not one of whom was a Ceylonese ; while 

 now our roll includes 203 Members, of whom no fewer than 97 

 are Ceylonese gentlemen, many of whom pre-eminently contribute 

 to our Journals and discussions. As our Bishop President well 

 said in his Jubilee historical sketch : " Instead of being a Society 

 of European Christian visitors, interested as visitors in an Island 

 to which they did not belong, we are now a Society of studious 

 people separated by many distinctions of race and association, 

 but all keenly interested in whatever belongs to Ceylon, whether 

 bound to it as the scene of our duty or by the still stronger ties of 

 fatherland." In this connection, too, we may dwell with some 

 complacency on the enterprise of " sons of the soil " in going forth 

 from Ceylon to take up work, and in many cases to fill important 

 posts in other parts of the world, not only in the United Kingdom, 

 but in America, South Africa, and Australia. To India, Burma, 

 and the Straits, Ceylon has given many of her educated sons as 

 teachers and preachers, as well as medical men, surveyors, engi- 

 neers, in the clerical and other services. Ceylonese merchants 

 and men of business are found in the United States and the 

 Continent of Europe, and I have heard of a Ceylonese family 

 supplying an electrical engineer of repute to a Midland company 

 in England, a doctor in good practice in South Africa, a man of 

 business in South America, and a teacher in a Metropolitan Public 

 School. A Sinhalese gentleman once closely associated with this 

 Society, Mr. D. M. de Zilva Wickremasinghe, besides being 

 Epigraphist to the Ceylon Government, is also Librarian and 

 Assistant Keeper of the Indian Institute, Oxford. 



Our Prospects and Papers before the Society. 



Among the promised Papers — to be read it is expected at an 

 early date — is one now in course of preparation by Dr. Donald 

 Ferguson on " The First Discovery of Ceylon by the Portuguese," 

 with several illustrations (executed in England), which have been 

 sanctioned by your Council. The peculiar appropriateness of this 

 Paper will be found in the fact that on 6th April next will be the 

 400th anniversary of the first landing of the Portuguese at 

 Colombo. Another valuable contribution will be " Some Survivals 

 in Kandyan Art," by Dr. A. K. Coomaraswamy, also with illustra- 

 tions. A third Paper will be on " Certain Ruins in the Ruhuna- 

 rata," by Mr. Arthur Jayawardana, retired Atapattu Mudaliyar 

 of Galle. There are also some proposed contributions by Mr. T. B. 

 Pohath Kehelpannala, which have to be considered by your 

 Council. 



Then I hope to complete the second and perhaps the more 

 practically interesting and useful part of my Paper on the exten- 

 sion of " Coconut Planting " — that is, in Dutch and British times , 



