Page:1902 Encyclopædia Britannica - Volume 26 - AUS-CHI.pdf/700

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CEYLON 644 from wind, for firewood, or for timber. A great advance has been £30,000, a year. The police number 1700 men and officers, costing ^ made at Hakgalla and Nuwara Eliya, in Upper Uva, and other Rs.6,50,000, or £44,000, a year. There are 65 hospitals and asylums (including lunatic and high districts, in naturalizing English fruits and vegetables. The calamander- tree is nearly extinct, and ebony and other fine leper asylums and the Royal Victoria Home for Incuiables), and cabinet woods are getting scarce ; but the conservation of forests 242 dispensaries. The Government Medical Department numbers after the Indian system has been taken in hand under a director 134 doctors and 227 apothecaries, and the whole establishment and trained officers, and much good has been done. The and administration cost annually about £80,000 net. Religion. — The principal religions may be distributed as cinnamon-tree (wild in the jungles, cultivated as a shrub in plantations) is almost the only one yielding a trade product follows :— Catholics 280,000 which is indigenous to the island. The cocoa-nut and nearly all 360,000 Christians f Roman Protestants 80,000 other palms have been introduced. 2,075,000 Buddhists ..... A Game Preservation Society and the judicious action of 900,000 Hindus Government have done much to prevent the wanton destruction 240,000 Mahommedans of Ceylon deer, elephants, &c., by establishing a close season. It is estimated that there must be 5000 wild elephants in the The anomaly of an ecclesiastical establishment of Anglican and Ceylon forests. Since 1864, 2800 elephants have been exported Presbyterian chaplains with a bishop of Colombo paid out of the (worth nominally, on the spot, £80,000), chiefly to India. A general revenues has been abolished in Ceylon, and only the license to shoot or capture and an export royalty are now levied bishop and two or three incumbents remain on the list for life, by Government. Capt. V. Legge includes 371 species of birds in or till they retire on pension. Government has had to legislate Ceylon, of which only two have been introduced into the island. for Buddhist temporalities, owing to the great corruption preInsects and reptiles do not trouble European residents so much as vailing among priestly and lay trustees of temples ; committees. in early years—at any rate in the towns, while in the higher planting districts there is almost complete exemption from their unwelcome attentions. Bungalows are more carefully built to resist white ants, drainage and cleanliness prevent mosquitoes and ticks from multiplying, while snakes and leeches avoid cultivated, occupied ground. Population.—The total population of Ceylon in 1891 and 1901, distributed according to the nine provinces now existing, was as follows :— Area Females, Estate Pop.3 in sq. 1901. 1901. Miles. 431,348 26,815 1,432 Western 283,772 285,096 2,300 Central 897 169,239 3,363 Northern 277,878 8,508 2,146 Southern 592 83,034 4,037 Eastern 157,926 9,726 North-Western 2,997 35,828 North-Central 4,002 85,894 51,793 3,155 Uva . 144,910 58,096 Sabaragamuwa 1,901 2 Total, Ceylon . 25,3331 3,012,224 3,576,990 1,907,161 1,669,829 441,523 1 more accurate survey now gives the total area as 25,363 square miles. The new provinces of Uva and Sabaragamuwa are almost entirely included in Kandyan territory. 23 Including military, 3360 ; shipping, 4104 ; Boer prisoners of war, 4913. Almost entirely immigrant coolies from Southern India. The distribution as to race is as follows (1901):— Sinhalese, including Kandyans. . . 2,334,817 Tamils ....... 952,237 “Moormen” (Mahommedans, chiefly Arab descendants) ..... 224,719 Malays ...•••• 11,207 Javanese, Kaffres, Afghans, Parsees, &c. . 20,115 Veddahs ...•••• 1,000 Burghers and Eurasians .... 23,312 Europeans, Americans, &c. . . . 9,583 Oxford, igoi. Altogether there are representatives of some seventy races in B. V.Darbishire & O.J.R Howartk. Sketch Map of Ceylon. Ceylon. The Veddahs, who run wild in the woods, are the aborigines of the island. The population of Colombo, the commercial, social, and political capital, is now 158,093, inclusive of for each are now nominally appointed, but it is doubtful if they work satisfactorily. In the Kandyan district, the temples being a floating population of about 4000. Administration.—The legislative council now includes, besides endowed and the priests independent, the latter have generally the governor as president and the nine official members, eight neglected their duties of teaching the young boys and keeping unofficial members—one for the Kandyan Sinhalese (or High- up the zeal of the people. In the low country the priests, being landers) and one for the “Moormen” having been added in 1890. dependent on voluntary offerings, have been generally zealous The term of office for the unofficial members is limited to five and active. Ignorance is greatest, as regards education, in the years, though the governor may reappoint if he choose. The districts where Buddhism is strongest. Of late years there has king’s advocate, the deputy-advocate, and the surveyor-general been a revival of Buddhism in the towns and adjacent districts, are°now respectively styled attorney-general, solicitor-general, and schools have been opened after Western models. There are 10,000 Buddhist priests in Ceylon. and director of public works. The civil service has been re- about Education.—There has been a great advance in public instrucconstituted into five classes, not including the colonial secretary tion since through the multiplication of vernacular, Angloas a staff appointment, nor ten cadets ; these five classes number vernacular,1875, and English schools by Government, by the difi'erent seventy officers. The jurisdiction of the district and police courts Christian missions, and by the Buddhists and Hindus who have was increased a few years ago. The district judges (numbering come forward to claim the Government grant. The Government 19) can punish up to two years’ imprisonment, and impose fines also started a technical college, and an agricultural school has up to Rs.1000. The police magistrates (numbering 25) can pass has reorganized. An agricultural department, recommended by sentences up to six months’ imprisonment, and impose fines of been a commission, should profit by the services of the entomologist, Rs.150. The criminal law has since 1890 been codified on the mycologist, and chemical analyst added by the governor model of the Indian penal code ; criminal and civil procedure have the staff of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Peradeniya. also been the subject of codification. There are twenty-three to prisons in the island, mostly small; but convict establishments There are industrial and reformatory schools, which are in and near the capital take all long-sentence prisoners. The partially supported by Government. In spite of the great average annual number of prisoners is 2271, each costing about advance that has been made, however, at the census of 1891 no £15 per annum. The total outlay on prisons is Rs. 4,50,000, or i fewer than 2,600,000 of the total population were entered as un»