258 



JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). 



[Vol. XIX. 



Eersten April 1799 gekogt door J. C. Hollebeek."* This 

 Hollebeek, it is known, was a resident at Galle about a hun- 

 dred years ago. The presence of the book in Ceylon seems 

 to me to be prima facie proof of the fact that the artist had 

 returned here and had brought the book with him ; although, 

 I admit, there is also room for other theories more remote, 

 as, for instance, of its having come here with his effects after 

 his death. The evidence afforded by this book is, however, 

 not merely confined to the point I have referred to. It would 

 seem to give us further glimpses into the life and occupation 

 of the artist. As the studies in the book are all of the human 

 figure in its various parts and aspects, they must have provided 

 him with exercise in figure drawing and painting ; and it is, I 

 think, reasonable to suppose that his profession as an artist 

 was not limited to the delineation of natural history objects, 

 such as those he designed for his patron ; but that he must 

 also have devoted his time to drawing and painting the 

 " human form divine." It is very probable that he was a 

 portrait painter. 



I come now to the subject of the grandfather — the Major 

 de Bevere referred to by Governor Loten. That this was the 

 Captain Willem Hendrik de Bevere who figured in Ceylon 

 history in the first and second decades of the eighteenth cen- 

 tury is, I think, more than probable. He might very well 

 have been the father of David Willemsz {i.e., Willem's son) de 

 Bevere and have brought over his son with him from Batavia, 

 as the particulars I have quoted from the Marriage Register 

 are quite in agreement with this supposition and also with the 

 ages which Loten assigns to his artist protege and his father. 

 That the father was born in Ceylon is, I think, clearly dis- 

 proved, and when Governor Loten, in later years, possibly 

 when in England, speaks of him as "a natural son of Major 

 de Bevere by a Cingalese or black Portuguese woman," he is not 

 quite correct. Major (or Captain) de Bevere had, as far as we 

 know, never been in Ceylon before 1708, and his son, born in 

 Batavia, could not have had a Cingalese or black Portuguese 

 for his mother ; although it is not impossible that the woman 



* " Qn the 1st April, 1799, bought by J. 0. Hollebeek. 



