325 CHAP. II. THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS OF CEYLON. DIVESTED of the insipid details which overlay them, the annals of Ceylon present comparatively few stirring incidents, and still fewer events of historic importance to repay the toil of their perusal. They profess to record no occurrence anterior to the advent of the last Buddha, the great founder of the national faith, who was born on the borders of Nepaul in the seventh century before Christ. In the theoretic doctrines of Buddhism "Buddhas" 1 are beings who appear after intervals of inconceivable extent; they undergo transmigrations extending over vast spaces of time, accumulating in each stage of existence an increased degree of merit, till, in their last incarnation as men, they attain to a degree of purity so immaculate as to entitle them to the final exaltation of "Buddha-hood," a state approaching to incarnate divinity, in which they are endowed with wisdom so supreme as to be competent to teach mankind the path to ultimate bliss. Their precepts, preserved orally or committed to writing, are cherished as bana or the "word;" their doctrines are incorporated in the system of dharma or "truth;" and, at their death, instead of entering on a new form of being, either corporeal or spiritual, they are absorbed into Nirwana, that state of blissful unconsciousness akin to annihilation which is regarded by Buddhists as the consummation of eternal felicity. 1 A sketch of the Buddhist re- sertations on Buddhism as it exists ligion may be seen in Sir J. EMERSON in Ceylon, will be found in the works TENNENT'S History of Christianity in of the Rev. R. SPENCE HARDY, EastCeylon, ch. v. London, 1850. But ern Monachism, Lond. 1850, and A the most profound and learned dis- | Manual of Buddhism, Lond. 1853. Gotama, who is represented as the last of the series of Buddhas1, promulgated a religious system in India which has exercised a wider influence over the Eastern world than the doctrines of any other uninspired teacher in any age or country. He was born B.C. 624 at Kapila-Vastu (a city which has no place in the geography of the Hindus, but which appears to have been on the borders of Nepaul); he attained his superior Buddha-hood B. C. 588, under a bo-tree3 in the forest of Urawela, the site of the present Buddha Gaya in Bahar; and, at the age of eighty, he died at Kusinara, a doubtful locality, which it has been sought to identify with the widely separated positions of Delhi, Assam, and Cochin China.4 In the course of his ministrations Gotama is said to have thrice landed in Ceylon. Prior to his first coming amongst them, the inhabitants of the island appear to have been living in the simplest and most primitive manner, supported on the almost spontaneous products of the soil. Gotama in person undertook their conversion, and alighted on the first occasion at Bintenne, where i. P. 42. 1 There were twenty-four Buddhas | Soc., vol. xvi. p. 233.) Another previous to the advent of Gotama, curious illustration of the prevalence who is the fourth in the present of his doctrines may be discovered Kalpa or chronological period. His in the endless variations of his name system of doctrine is to endure for in the numerous countries over which 5000 years, when it will be superhis influence has extended: Buddha, seded by the appearance and preaching Budda, Bud, Bot, Baoth, Buto, Budsof his successor. Rajaratnacari, ch. do, Bdho, Pout, Pote, Fo, Fod, Fohi, Fuh, Pet, Pta, Poot, Phthi, Phut, Pht, &c.-PocoCKE's India in Greece, appendix, 397. HARDY's Buddhism, ch. vii. p. 355. HARDY in his Eastern Monachism says, "There is no country in either Europe or Asia, except those that are Buddhist, in which the same religion is now professed that was there existent at the time of the Redeemer's death," ch. xxii. p. 327. 2 HARDY'S Eastern Monachism, ch. i. p. 1. There is evidence of the widely-spread worship of Buddha in the remotely separated individuals with whom it has been sought at various times to identify him. "Thus it has been attempted to show that Buddha was the same as Thoth of the Egyptians, and Turm of the Etruscans, that he was Mercury, Zoroaster, Pythagoras, the Woden of the Scandinavians, the Manes of the Manichæans, the prophet Daniel, and even the divine author of Christianity." (PROFESSOR WILSON, Journ. Asiat. 3 The Pippul, Ficus religiosa. 4 Professor H. H. WILSON has identified Kusinara or Kusinagara with Kusia in Gorakhpur, Journ. Roy, Asiat. Soc. vol. xvi. p. 246. there exists to the present day the remains of a monument erected two thousand years ago1 to commemorate his arrival. His second visit was to Nagadipo in the north of the island, at a place whose position yet remains to be determined; and the "sacred foot-print" on Adam's Peak is still worshipped by his devotees as the miraculous evidence of his third and last farewell. To the question as to what particular race the inhabitants of Ceylon at that time belonged, and whence or at what period the island was originally peopled, the Buddhist chronicles furnish no reply. And no memorials of the aborigines themselves, no monuments or inscriptions, now remain to afford ground for speculation. Conjectures have been hazarded, based on no sufficient data, that the Malayan type, which extends from Polynesia to Madagascar, and from Chin-India to Taheite, may still be traced in the configuration, and in some of the immemorial customs, of the people of Ceylon.2 But the greater probability is, that a branch of the same stock which originally colonised the Dekkan extended its migrations to Ceylon. All the records and traditions of the peninsula point to a time when its 1 By Dutugaimunu, B.C. 164. For an account of the present condition of this Dagoba at Bintenne, see Vol. II. P. IX. ch. ii. 2 Amongst the incidents ingeniously pressed into the support of this conjecture is the use by the natives of Ceylon of those double canoes and boats with outriggers, which are never used on the Arabian side of India, but which are peculiar to the Malayan race in almost every country to which they have migrated; Madagascar and the Comoro islands, Sooloo, Luzon, the Society Islands, and Tonga. PRITCHARD'S Races of Man, ch. iv. p. 17. For a sketch of this peculiar canoe, see Vol. II. P. VII. ch. i. There is a dim tradition that the first settlers in Ceylon arrived from the coasts of China. It is stated in the introduction to RIBEYRO's History of Ceylon, but rejected by VALENTYN, ch. iv. p. 61. The legend prefixed to RIBEYRO is as follows. "Si nous en croyons les historiens Portugais, les Chinois ont été les premiers qui ont habité cette isle, et cela arriva de cette manière. Ces peuples étoient les maîtres du commerce de tout l'orient; quelques unes de leurs vaisseaux furent portéz sur les basses qui sont près du lieu, que depuis on appelle Chilao par corruption au lieu de Cinilao. Les équipages se sauvèrent à terre, et trouvant le pais bon et fertile ils s'y établirent: bientôt après ils s'allièrent avec les Malabares, et les Malabares y envoyoient ceux qu'ils exiloient et qu'ils nominoient Galas. Ces exiles s'étant confondus avec les Chinois, de deux noms n'en ont fait qu'un, et se sont appellés Chin-galas |