16 



JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). [YOL. XVI. 



Y.— Letter from Mr. A. E. Buultjens giving accounts of the padrao 

 erected as a monument of the discovery of Ceylon by the Portuguese. 



VI. —Letter from the Delegate Apostolic stating his opinion that 

 (i) the coat of arms was engraved by order of Don Lourenzo de 

 Almeida ; (ii) that the date on the stone is 1561, not 1501 ; (iii) that 

 the date and the cross were added later by a different hand. 



VII. — Note by Mr. F. H. de Vos. 

 VIII— Note by Mr. A. E. Buultjens. 

 IX.— Note by Mr. D. W. Ferguson. 



Gerard A. Joseph. 



APPENDIX. 



I.— His Excellency the Delegate Apostolic to His 

 Excellency the Governor of Ceylon. 



Kandy, September 7, 1898. 



Your Excellency, — I beg leave to call Your Excellency's attention 

 to the enclosed note from the Ceylon Independent of to-day. If the 

 fact is rightly described, the discovery would be very interesting from 

 an archaeological point of view, and would mean a rather important 

 historical relic of Ceylon. The old Portuguese chronicles relate that 

 when Don Lourenzo de Almeida, son of the Viceroy Don Francisco, 

 and leader of the first Portuguese expedition to this Island, was about 

 to leave Ceylon in December, 1505, he had the coat of arms of 

 Portugal carved on a rock at the entrance of Colombo harbour. 



The date 1501 given by the paper must be a mistake. The 

 Portuguese coat of arms bearing this date may be found in Ceylon. 

 I beg to remain, &c, 



Ladislaus Michael, 

 Archbishop of Thebes and Delegate Apostolic. 



II. — Account in the Ceylon Independent, September 7, 1898. 

 Footprints of Portugal.— The old building at the root of the 

 Breakwater, which for years did duty as headquarters of the Harbour 

 Police, had always borne the reputation of being haunted, and a 

 number of weird stories are related of the uncanny phantom one 

 might meet about the spot. On Monday, while the coolies were at the 

 work of demolishing the structure, a curious bit of engraving came to 

 light. One of the large rocks at the bottom of the building was found 

 to have carved on it an excellently executed Portuguese coat of arms, 

 looking no older than a month, with the date 1501 rudely, but quite 

 legibly, carved to the right of it. In the vicinity of the stone there were 

 found a few human mouldy bones, which were taken by those acquainted 

 with the tales of ghosts as evidence of their credibility. The discovery 



