[Footnote 1:  DI CONTI in Ramusio, vol. i. p. 344.  There are two other Italian travellers of this century who touched at Ceylon; one a “GENTLEMAN OF FLORENCE,” whose story is printed by Ramusio (but without the author’s name), who accompanied Vasco de Gama, in the year 1479, in his voyage to Calicut, and who speaks of the trees “che fanno la canella in molta perfettione.”—­Vol. i. p. 120.  The other is GIROLAMO DI SANTO STEFANO, a Genoese, who, in pursuit of commerce, made a journey to India which he described on his return in 1499, in a letter inserted by Ramusio in his collection of voyages.  He stayed but one day in the island, and saw only its coco-nuts, jewels, and cinnamon.—­Vol. i. p. 345.]

The sixteenth century was prolific in navigators, the accounts of whose adventures served to diffuse throughout Europe a general knowledge of Ceylon, at least as it was known superficially before the arrival of the Portuguese.  Ludovico Barthema, or Varthema, a Bolognese[1], remained at a port on the west coast[2] for some days in 1506.  The four kings of the island being busily engaged in civil war[3], he found it difficult to land, but he learned that permission to search for jewels at the foot of Adam’s Peak might be obtained by the payment of five ducats, and restoring as a royalty all gems over ten carats.  Fruit was delicious and abundant, especially artichokes and oranges[4], but rice was so insufficiently cultivated that the sovereigns of the island were dependent for their supplies upon the King of Narsingha, on the continent of India.[5] This statement of Barthema is without qualification; there can be little doubt that it applied chiefly to the southern parts of the island, and that the north was still able to produce food sufficient for the wants of the inhabitants.

[Footnote 1:  Itinerario de LUDOVICO DE VARTHEMA, Bolognese, no lo Egypto, ne la Suria, ne la Arabia Deserta e Felice, ne la Persia, ne la India, e ne la, AEthiopia—­la fede el vivere e costume de tutte le prefatte provincie. Roma. 1511, A.D.]

[Footnote 2:  Probably Colombo.]

[Footnote 3:  These conflicts and the actors in them are described in the Rajavali, p. 274.]

[Footnote 4:  “Carzofoli megliori che li nostri, melangoli dolci, li megiiori credo, che siano nel mondo.”—­Varthema, pt. xxvii.]

[Footnote 5:  “In questo paese non nasce riso; ma ne li viene da terra ferma.  Li re de quella isola sono tributarii d’il re de Narsinga per repetto del riso.”—­Itin., pt. xxvii.  See also BARBOSA, in Ramusio, vol. i p. 312.]

Barthema found the supply of cinnamon small, and so precarious that the cutting took place but once in three years.  The Singhalese were at that time ignorant of the use of gunpowder[1], and their arms were swords and lance-heads mounted on shafts of bamboo; “with these they fought, but their battles were not bloody.”  The Moors were in possession of the trade, and the king sent a message to Varthema and his companions, expressive of his desire to purchase their commodities; but in consequence of a hint that payment would be regulated by the royal discretion, the Italians weighed anchor at nightfall and bade a sudden adieu to Ceylon.