o
mind to hear. And we suspect that our honest fellows of the 19th Regiment,
whose comrades had been murdered in their beds by the cursed Kandyan
"nobles," neither did nor would understand the claim of such assassins to
military salutes, to the presenting of arms, or to the turning out of the
guard. Here, it is said, began the ill-blood, and also on the claim of the
Buddhist priests to similar honours. To say the simple truth, these
soldiers ought not to have been expected to show respect towards the
murderers of their brethren. The priests, with their shaven crowns and
yellow robes, were objects of mere mockery to the British soldier. "Not to
have been kicked," it should have been said, "is gain; not to have been
cudgeled, is for you a ground of endless gratitude. Look not for salutes;
dream not of honours." For our own part--again we say it--let the
government look a-head for endless insurrections. We tax not the rulers of
Ceylon with having caused the insurrections. We hold them blameless on
that head; for a people so fickle and so unprincipled will never want such
matter for rebellion as would be suspected, least of all, by a wise and
benevolent man. But we _do_ tax the local government with having
ministered to the possibility of rebellion. We British have not sowed the
ends and objects of conspiracies; but undoubtedly, by our lax
administration, we have sowed the _means_ of conspiracies. We must not
transfer to a Pagan island our own mild code of penal laws: the subtle
savage will first become capable of these, when he becomes capable of
Christianity. And to this we must now bend our attention. Government must
make no more offerings of musical clocks to the Pagan temples; for such
propitiations are understood by the people to mean--that we admit their
god to be naturally stronger than ours. Any mode or measure of excellence
but that of power, they understand not, as applying to a deity. Neither
must our government any longer wink at such monstrous practices as that of
children ejecting their dying parents, in their last struggles, from the
shelter of their own roofs, on the plea that death would pollute their
dwellings. Such compliances with Paganism, make Pagans of ourselves. Nor,
again, ought the professed worship of devils to be tolerated, more than
the Fetish worship, or the African witchcraft, was tolerated in the West
Indies. Having, at last, obtained secure possession of the entire island,
with no reversionar