CEYLON. 
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example of the Dutch. These greatly oppressed the Catholics under 
their dominion, who were not permitted to have a separate burial 
ground, and were obliged to pay extravagant fees for permission to 
bury with the Protestants. This law was abrogated by General 
Stuart. The tax on their marriages also amounted, under the 
Dutch, nearly to a prohibition. This order of people, therefore, 
has been a considerable gainer by our conquest. 
The administration of justice, under the Dutch, was equally igno- 
rant and corrupt. Their courts were composed of men without know- 
ledge, without education, without character, and without control. 
Judges became such, from holding offices to which chance or bribery 
had promoted them, and were themselves the refuse of their country. 
Not a Dutch tradesman would put his son into the service of the 
East India Company, unless he apprehended that he would dis- 
grace his family by staying at home. The practice was even worse 
than the theory. Advocates were not allowed to plead before them. 
Their proctors and attornies were admitted to act, by the favour of 
government, without the least pretension to professional knowledge. 
Causes even of the most important nature were not always heard in 
court; but after interrogatories made by the fiscal, who was not 
necessarily a lawyer, in the presence of two members of the court of 
justice more ignorant than himself, who had no right to interfere 
in the case, and no voice in the decision of it, the conclusion of the 
fiscal was generally sent round to the members of the tribunal, and 
signed by them out of court, with a want of examination and 
caution utterly unjustifiable. 
A remarkable instance of the carelessness of the Dutch criminal 
administration occurred to Mr. North. A man, condemned to the 
