NO. 42—1891.] ANCIENT INDUSTRIES. 



9 



that are familiar in history, and have produced like results, 

 wherever the cultivation of the soil has been pursued 

 intelligently and under favourable natural conditions. 



It may be suggested, at this stage of the argument, that 

 Tennent's conclusion, which has had to be rejected, however 

 reluctantly, may have been due to his regarding Yakhhd as 

 a synonym for Veddd, whose mode of life he describes. This 

 is manifestly a mistake, as has already been pointed out. 

 However his conclusion may have originated, it is worthy of 

 note that the glory of a subsequent period of the Sinhalese 

 history is referred by him to the splendid system of agri- 

 culture which was then engaging the attention of the most 

 renowned of their kings, and was giving rise to some of the 

 grandest works of irrigation that have ever been accom- 

 plished by man. The task undertaken in this Paper is to 

 show that those great achievements are but a higher develop- 

 ment of the same industry which had, even in Wijayo's 

 time, already made Sihala renowned, and caused it to be 

 selected by Gautama Buddha as a specially suitable field for 

 the introduction of his religion. 



The food of the people, rich and poor alike, is continually 

 specified in the history of the period in question, both in 

 reference to the rations served out by the people and the 

 State to the priests and monks, and also as the staple food 

 of all classes, from the king on his throne to the labourer in 

 the field. This article of food, rice, therefore was the parti- 

 cular product to which the agriculture of the period was 

 devoted. This it was that yielded the revenues of the State 

 and gave to the country the institutions and advanced 

 condition that is reflected in the works of which some ruins 

 yet remain to attest the truth of the historic record. Con- 

 tinually as the items of rice, rice cakes, rice broth, milk rice, 

 recur, it is remarkable that no other grain is mentioned, nor 

 other food, except butter, curds, sugar, and honey. Rice in 

 a golden dish was served to the king, and the same viand, in 

 a less sumptuous form, was also the food of the priests and 

 the people. 



