COLUMBO. 
^77 
manner as completely to cover them. The ceiling was formed of 
white cloth, under which was a fret-work of moss sustained by 
strings, which had a very pretty effect, as the moss was most beautiful, 
and is not unaptly called by the natives the jeweller's sorrow, from 
his inability to imitate its delicate texture. Lamps were suspended 
the whole way, and others were placed among the trees ; yet with 
all this it was not well lighted up, for the floor was too brown, and 
the green leaves too dark. 
Being by indisposition much confined, I was able to collect many 
interesting particulars concerning the island, of which the follow- 
ing observations are the result. 
Nothing can be more singular than the political state of Cey- 
lon, since its coasts have been in the possession of Europeans. 
The native prince, in his capital of Candy, at the centre of the 
island, has been completely cut oflf from all connexion with other 
countries by the foreigners, who have enclosed him in a ring of 
their settlements, occupying the whole of the sea-coast ; so that he 
has been obliged to ask their permission, even for bringing over 
from the Malabar coast a wife of his own cast, which, by the laws 
of his religion, he is bound to do. On the other hand, the Euro- 
peans, confined to their narrow slip of coast, have been debarred 
access to the interior, and deprived of any other communication 
between their settlements on the different sides of the island, than 
by sea, or the circuitous track round the shore. 
It was impossible that such a mode of division should not occa- 
sion perpetual quarrels ; and accordingly we find that the Portu- 
guese, and their successors the Dutch, were engaged in frequent 
and bloody hostilities with the natives, who, of course, regarded 
