THE ISLAND OF CEYLON. 
51 
called the Straits of Manaar. The passage from this island to 
Ramiseram on the Coromandel coast is not above twelve or 
fourteen leagues ; but the advantages which might be derived 
from this speedy communication are in a great measure pre- 
vented by the numberless shallows and sandbanks which every 
where interrupt the passage, and are so high as to be many 
of them completely dry except during the monsoons. There 
is in particular a line of sandbanks which runs quite across 
from Manaar to Ramiseram, known by the name of Adam's 
bridge. The name and situation of these banks are connect- 
ed with a variety of curious traditions among the natives. 
It is universally believed among them that Ceylon was either 
the Paradise in wdiich the ancestor of the human race resided, 
or the spot on which he first touched on being expelled from 
a Celestial Paradise. Adam's bridge is with them, the way 
by which he passed over to the continent ; and some imagine 
that the Gulph of Manaar, like the Red Sea in scriptural 
history, closed after him to prevent his return. The opinion 
however, is almost universally received, that Ceylon at a 
distant period formed a part of the continent, and w as after- 
wards separated from it by some great convulsion of nature. 
This account, though merely an unsupported tradition, is not 
altogether improbable ; for when we consider the narrowness 
of the intervening space, and the numberless shallows with 
which it abounds, it cannot be denied that some violent 
earthquake, or still more likely, some extraordinary eruption 
