( 130 ) 
changes necessary for the restoration of agriculture 
and render the mass of the populations able to 
give a greater revenue. 
The chiefs are interested in the preaevvation of 
he present system of Government, particularly in 
the farming out of lands. Their collection with 
the contractors being evident, the oppression of 
the people and arrears in the revenue must 
result from it without any fear of disorder, this 
predudieal influence may be removed. 
1st. By executing the plan of placing magistrates 
in the Corles or subdivisions of the country, 
in proportion to the number of the inhabitants, 
2nd. Especially by collecting the revenues through 
means of native servants, paid monthly without 
interference of the chiefs ; except to keep the 
accounts which they must deliver to the Collector 
General, to serve as a check to the person who 
receives the revenue and to the notes of the land 
revenue which the Magistrate should be obliged 
to keep for the safety of the owner of the land. 
3id. By naming no useless cliief, ' and by 
avoiding immediate filling up of any vacant post, 
-rather allowing the second in degree to exercise 
the vacanc office, that the employ of a Mudlyar of 
a Corle should be carried on by the Muhandiran 
or by the chief of the neighbouring province. 
This plan would keep everyone to his duty in the 
hopes of such an appointment, and would aff ord 
an opportunity of gradually transferring the 
offices to the other families, as equity and policy 
making expedient— in this manner those preten- 
sions "to inheritance of employment which some 
families arrogate themselves, would be effectually 
done away. 
4th. Lastly by following the plan of M. Van 
de Graaf and inserting in the certificates of ap- 
pointments of any chief that its validity is for 
four years. This clause is better than the term 
at will to keep everyone to his duty. 
The abolition of Corvees and exemption of 
castes who had been liable to it from that direct 
service, was one of the first act of the Collector 
General in 1796. He thereby deprived Government 
of the labourers requisite in several districts of the 
Island, and without any means of replacing it, 
of a considerable revenue derived from the re- 
demption of the Corvee by individuals subject to 
it, and who had both the will and means of per- 
forming it. This was a double loss for Government 
which was obliged to pay excessit^ely high for 
that work which was previously done for nothing; 
perhaps the Collector wished to indemnify those 
castes for the loss which they had sustained, by 
his introducing into the island a multitude of 
strangers, who took from them their means of 
subsisting and their retail commerce. To judge 
of this operation, we need only know what passed 
subsequently. 
The withdrawal of lands granted under the 
tenure of service (Parvenies) to the naides* who 
are by birth liable to service for Government ac- 
count as well as the lands granted asaccomodacens 
by Government to all its servants, natives of the 
country as a means of support, was an act o^ the 
King's Government which the Dutch had already 
mediated, at least in part. To judge of its merit we 
must enter into a few details— we begin with 
' *~Thia term Naides which is unknown in Kandy 
may have been invented by the Wellala caste, which 
leckons itself priviledged, after the arrival of the 
Portugnese, to mark its distinction from the other 
castes, the more so as the Portngaese intermarried 
with tbetn. 
The accomodacens — the withdrawal of the lands 
granted to all the great and petty chiefs as 
accomodaces was not only a political act but 
one of good service, and we shall only remark 
on this head. 
1st. That the application of lands so withdrawn 
has not been advantageous to Government. 
2nd. That the salaries given as an equivalent to 
the principal chiefs have been doubly too high, 
as it was not at all necessary that they should 
fit up their houses in the European style and 
bum wax candles in silver candlesticks, instead 
of the lamp which served them before. 
The acconiodficens called Aratchies,Caugaans and 
Lascoreens should have been continued, because the 
pay given to those useful men is higher than the 
revenue of the lands taken from them. They should 
only have been reduced to a proper number, but 
as that withdrawal has taken place it would be 
useless to retract what had been done- 
It is different from the serviceable Provinces 
or lands granted to the low castes, whose services 
might be made infinitely more valuable than the 
revenue of those lands. An examination into this 
would show what would be done, besides this 
the real poverty of those castes should have induced 
the Government to give them the whole property 
of tho=e lands under payment of a tenth of the pro- 
duce (ottoo) and a service of .SO days in the year 
which mightbe redeemable for life and SOfanams, on 
an individual agreement, and afterwards by com- 
mon consent of the caste. This would have classified 
them with the inhabitants of some parts of Ceylon 
who pay the Hoofil-geld or capitation tax, and are 
at the same time labourers, a class which gives most 
profit to Government for besides twoKixdollars Capi- 
tation tax, each male pays $ or 10 Parras of Nelie 
as his tenth. If it were then possible to place 
all the inhabitants of Ceylon on this footing the 
revenue would be immense and the collection of it 
most easy. It would be very useful if the castes 
would resume their parvenies on these conditions to 
give them back to them, without at first mention- 
ing the redemption of service, but only for 
performance of it and payments of the tenths. It 
would be prudent that every concession of lands 
made her;ceforth to the lower castes should be 
on those conditions. The land should be measured, 
portioned out and reduced to maps at the expense of 
Government, which would place bounds to the 
greediness of those who ask for more than they 
can cultivate. The best lands should always be 
given to those castes, and lands bordering thereon 
should always be kept to be granted afterwards if 
the population increased ; these should be free from 
the payment of tenths the three first years after 
the clearing of them. 
The .30 days of labour of the castes replaced in 
their Parvenies might be advantageously applied 
to clear away and give value to the lands which 
belong to Government, who might have them culti- 
vated for half the harvest, ^as ande weldew were 
formerly nnder the Dutch Government, No better 
manner of applying the services of these castes can 
be devised if the work be undertaken and superin- 
tended by honest and experienced persons. Atten- 
tion must be paid to clear away at the same 
time good high lands in the vicinity which might 
be good for the plantation of coconut trees, because 
the Sinhalese desire always to have gardens near 
their fields, and because arrack of collove seems to 
have become an article in great request in India. 
The Portuguese, and the Dutch still more so, granted 
