No. 42.— 1891.] ANCIENT INDUSTRIES. 7 



(asbestos), a right-hand chank of Ganges water, a royal 

 virgin, golden vessels, and costly drugs, &c. 



Regarding the condition of the country, as postulated, and 

 the very considerable population necessary to the attainment 

 and maintenance of such a condition, the idea that the 

 country depended upon such a precarious and slender 

 resource as that of casual wrecks appears to be scarcely worth 

 arguing. At any rate, it is not an argument which could hold 

 ground without some stronger evidence and support than 

 that of a passing mention, under circumstances that lend it 

 no collateral force beyond the brief statement itself. 



The second argument is equally inconclusive. The idea 

 of this comparatively paltry contribution to a country 

 supposed to be dependent upon foreign supplies of rice, 

 would seem, as an item in an otherwise sumptuous royal 

 gift, as a very insulting suggestion. Moreover, the fact that 

 the present was of paddy, and not of rice, indicates that it 

 was intended for seed, especially as it is described as hill 

 paddy — a special product which was probably unknown in 

 Ceylon, or a particularly valuable variety such as it would 

 become a king to send to a neighbouring monarch. What- 

 ever may have been the object of this particular gift, it can- 

 not be reasonally urged, as valid evidence, that the country 

 depended for its food supply, or for rice in particular, upon 

 foreign sources, or that it had no regular and systematic 

 cultivation of grain. Even if collateral circumstances were 

 not, as they assuredly are, quite inconsistent with the 

 dependence of the people on foreign supplies of food, these 

 two trivial incidents, casually mentioned in the historic 

 narrative, would not be regarded as possessing any inherent 

 force. Considering that they are not only quite unsupported, 

 but are in themselves out of keeping with the tenour of 

 the narrative, they may be dismissed. 



Before concluding the argument for the incompatibility 

 of Sir Emerson Tennent's theory, in any form, with the 

 proved facts of the situation when Wijayo ruled the realm, 

 it may be mentioned that the annual value of the gems 



