<A MONTHLY. 
Vol. XIX. 
COLOMBO, FEBRUARY 1st, 1900. 
No. 8. 
"PIONEERS OF THE PLANTING ENTERPRISE IN CEYLON," 
(Third Series.) 
THE LATE SIR JAMES D. ELPHINSTONE, BART. 
AND 
SIR mm H. D. ELPHINSTONE, BART. 
O one acquainted with the his- 
tory of CocDnut, Coffee, Cia- 
chona and Tea Planting in 
Ceylon, can for a njonienfc 
deny the right of the two 
gentlemen at the head of our 
column — the late and the 
living Baronets— to be in- 
cluded in the list of Planting Pioneers of 
Ceylon. Sir James Elphinstone was connected 
with Ceylon from 1837 till his death in 1886— 
close on 50 years. He was one of the first 
Europeans to go in for Coconut planting in 
the Jaffna peninsula. He became a Ceylon Ci.fT j 
Estate proprietor at the very beginning of the 
enterprise in the early "forties." He was at 
the time Commander of an " East Indiaman," 
and, visiting the island, he traversed the hill- 
country when there was no road beyond Gampola, 
and, penetrating into the Kotmale Valley, selected 
the BalmDindrah block, having for his neighbours 
Capt. Forbes and Capt. Payne-Gallwey. 
Much might be said of general interest about 
nearly-related and distinguished members of the 
families of Elphinstone and Dalrymple ; but such 
records would unduly swell our memoir, and we 
must content ourselves with " one leaf out of the 
past," referring to the notable lady who wa» 
mother of Sir James, and grandmother of Sir 
Graeme, — after whom indeed he was called 
"Dame GRiEME Dalrymple Horn Elphin- 
stone,"— born May 10th, 1782, died, aged 88, on 
January 28th, 1870 ; and we give the following 
reference published at the time of her death 
THE LATE DOWAGER LADY DALRYMPLE 
HORN ELPHINSTONE. 
(From the "Aberdeen, Journal," Febrtiary 9, 1870.) 
Our obituaries of the past week have chronicled 
the death of a venerated lady, of the last century, 
cue of a generation now fast passing away, and in 
her instance claiming something more than an or- 
dinary notifioation. 
The Dowager Lady Dalrymple Horn Elphinstone 
entered on the duties of the House she has so much 
dignified and adorned for the last threescore and 
ten years in the first o£ the century, then a youny 
bride of eighteen, and a wide circle of relatives and 
a very wide one of friends in all ranks of lite now 
mourn for "one removed" of no ordinary dignity 
of character and personal bearing; endeared to, and 
reverenced by all around her far beyond the happy 
lot of most who die. Of her, indeed, it might almost 
be said, "to see her was to love her." Those who 
knew her will readily echo this. 
Her character was of the most engaging kind, To 
the writer of these lines — whose happy recollection 
of this, his elevated, earliest, leau ideal of a lady 
reaches beyond half a century back— she seemed to 
