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



[Vol. XX. 



because he was afraid to fight, went and entered a port that 

 they call Beadala 1 . The land of this place has the appearance 

 of a thumb, because on the outer side of it, as it were at 

 the first joint, where it joins the hand, stands the town, 

 and on the other and inner side is a large gulf, as one can 

 figure by separating all the other four fingers from this 

 thumb, which form the coast that ends at the point and 

 cape that they call Canhameira 2 . At the end of this thumb 

 on the nail is built a sumptuous heathen temple, Ramanacor 

 by name 3 ; and so narrow is the land from this sea outside 

 to that inside the gulf, where stands Beadala, that Joao 

 Fernandez Correa 4 , the former captain of the fishery of 

 seed-pearl, which is fished in that latitude, was about to 

 cut through that land. And the advantage of this breach 

 was, that that passage from there to Canhameira is full of 

 many islets, sandbanks, and shoals ; and in windy weather 

 it is very perilous for navigation. And passing through this 

 breach that he intended to make, vessels would enter the 

 great gulf, and with the mainland that lay at the upper part 

 they would be more sheltered, and it would be better sailing, 

 and moreover it would be advantageous to the captains of the 

 fishery who were stationed there 5 . 



1 Vedalai on the Ramnad coast (see Hob.-Job. s.v., where Yule has 

 confused Payichchi Marakkar with 'Ali Ibrahim). 



2 Point Calimere. This must not be confused with the Canhameira 

 (Conimere) on the Coromandel coast (seeHob.-Job. s.v. '« Conhameira"). 

 Curiously enough, Yule has omitted to enter Calimere Point in his 

 monumental work. Barros in I. ix. i. mentions the two, as Canha- 

 meira and Conhomeira. 



3 Ramanakovil, the famous temple on the (now) island of Pamban. 



4 In Couto VII. ix. iii. (p. 192) we shall meet with him as captain of 

 Negapatam (in 1560). 



6 The foregoing passage is of great interest in connection with the 

 history of the Pamban channel. According to Hunter's Imp. Gaz. xi. 

 22, " the ancient records preserved in the temple of Rameswaram 

 relate that in the year 1480 a violent storm breached the isthmus, 

 and that, despite efforts to restore the connection, subsequent 

 storms rendered the breach permanent." I cannot find that the 

 pioneer work of the Portuguese in the cutting of the channel has 

 been noticed by writers on the subject. According to the anonymous 

 writer of Primor e Honra (i. 24) the actual cutting of *fche channel was 

 carried out by Joao Fernandes Correa in 1549, when the Jesuit 

 father Antonio Criminal was murdered by the natives (see F- y S. 

 II. ii. vii. 6). 



