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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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C.O. 882

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO

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inquiry into the prospects of the coffee enterprise in Uva, and a fuller and more reliable "examination of the estimated traffic on that line justify the island incurring the proposed "debt of Rs. 6,000,000." At a subsequent meeting of the Association, a memorial addressed to your Lordship was adopted embodying its own proceedings, together with extracts or translations from the native press, in order to show to your Lordship "the "remarkable consensus of opinion which prevails at the present day amongst natives on "the subject of the proposed extension." I have been informed by the Chairman of the Association that, though this memorial was forwarded to the Government on the 29th March last, it had not been sent up to your Lordship as late as the 30th May last, and that the Colonial Secretary has informed him that it would be sent up with the report of the Railway Commission. I enclose herewith three copies of the said memorial with its

annexures.

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5. I am also advised that in order to counteract the value of our opposition, Mr. Ferguson of the "Ceylon Observer," not content with heaping in the columns of that newspaper unmeasured terms of abuse and calumny upon his opponents, has drawn a memorial to your Lordship, purporting to be in the name of the natives of the island, and that Mr. Dias Bandaragrayake, the Maha Mudalyar and native Aide-de-Camp to His Excellency the Governor, has been circulating this memorial and using his authority to induce ignorant natives to attach their names to it, in support of the policy of the Government. Without quoting from the many private letters I have received as to the way in which the "secret memorial" has been circulated and signed, I take leave to annex, for your Lordship's information, two numbers of the " Ceylon Examiner paper, published on the 21st and 25th May respectively, which animadvert strongly upon the erroneous statements made in the said memorial, and upon the extraordinary methods pursued to overcome our opposition. If his Excellency Sir Arthur Gordon knew the part which the officer on his staff was playing, I need hardly say that the misdirected zeal of that officer would have been instantly checked. As regards the contents of the memorial, 1 am in a position to state that the majority of the members of the Ceylon Agricultural Association are not lawyers; that the few who are lawyers have a very substantial interest in the agricultural enterprise of the island; and that most of those who have signed the "secret memorial," from their ignorance and distance from the metropolis, could not possibly know anything of the constitution of the Association or of Mr. John Ferguson's views, which they are unblushingly made to endorse.

6. On the other hand, the opposition led by me in council rests upon facts and figures and not on idle statements or vain anticipations. Outside the Council the opinions of the native press have been intelligently and reasonably expressed without a word of abuse or ill-feeling; and the Ceylon Agricultural Association, which I have said is representative of the Sinhalese, Tamil, and Burgher interests in the agricultural enterprise of the island, has openly and constitutionally discussed the subject, having in view not the benefits of any special class or clique, but of the entire island.

7. Inspired as we are with such motives, we believe that the hope of making the extension to Haputale pay on the proposed scale of expenditure is very illusory, and that the soundest policy will be to institute an immediate inquiry into the working of the Darjeeling system of railway, and if it be found as inexpensive and as sufficing for the wants of the Uva Province as it is represented to be, then to adopt it and carry the railway on to Badulla on the said system.

The Right Hon. Earl Granville, K.G.,

the Secretary of State for the Colonies,

Downing Street, London.

No. 7.

I have, &c.

(Signed)

P. RÁMA NÁTHAN,

M.L.C., Ceylon.

GOVERNOR THE HON. Sra A. H. GORDON, G.C.M.G., to the RIGHT HON. THE EARL GRANVILLE, K.G. (Received August 9, 1886.)

(No. 276.)

MY LORD,

The Pavilion, Kandy, Ceylon, July 16, 1886.

I HAD the honour in my Despatch, No. 259, of the 23rd ultimo,† to transmit to your Lordship a memorial from the Agricultural Association of Ceylon on the subject of railway extension.

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2. I have now the honour to enclose printed copies of a memorial of a very different character which has just reached me. It is one in favour of the immediate extension of the railway to Haputale, and is signed by between 15,000 and 16,000 Singhalese interested in agricultural pursuits.

3. The original, which only reached my hands yesterday, is retained for careful analysis, and will be forwarded by the next mail, together with a report on the signatures.

4. Meanwhile, I am informed, on what I believe is reliable authority, that the signatures comprise those of the great part of the Native landowners of the western and southern provinces, and a large proportion of those of Uva and Kandy.

5. The memorial must be regarded chiefly as a demonstration in favour of the railway extension; but also partly as a protest against the assumption by Mr. Rama-Nathan, a Jaffna Tamil, of the position of a spokesman of the Singhalese population.

I have, &c. (Signed)

The Right Hon. Earl Granville, K.G.,

&c.

&c.

&c.

Enclosure in No. 7.

ARTHUR GORDON.

MEMORIAL from AGRICULTURAL CEYLONESE in favour of RAILWAY EXTENSION to Haputale.

To the RIGHT HONOURABLE EARL GRANVILLE, K.G., Secretary of State for the Colonies, &c., &c., &c.

The humble Memorial of the undersigned Natives of Ceylon engaged in agricultural pursuits, most respectfully sheweth—

1. That your memorialists are much disturbed by the action of a body which takes to itself the title of the Ceylon Agricultural Association, but is mainly composed of members of the legal profession resident in and around Colombo, who have memorialised your Lordship against the proposed railway extension to Haputale in Uva.

2. That your memorialists who do not belong to the Agricultural Association, but who are one and all connected with the agricultural interests of the island, strongly support the action of his Excellency the Governor and the Executive Council in recommending the early commencement of the railway to Uva.

3. That your memorialists are convinced from all they have read and heard on the subject that the taxpayers of this colony can never receive the full benefit of the large sum spent on the railway to Nanu Oya until the line is continued and opened to Haputale, which indeed is the first point where a stop ought to have been made after Nawalapitiya, because only in Uva can additional new traffic be reached, which will bring paying returns.

4. That your memorialists, many of them resident in Uva, beg to point out to your Lordship that the large body of Natives in that new province are in urgent need of railway communication with Colombo and the western divisions of the island, for at present they have no market whatever for much of their garden and farm produce, from want of such means of transport,

5. That the Uva native cultivatora and farmers cannot afford carriage by cart for 150 miles to the Colombo market, but that if the heavy estate traffic now carried along the Ratnapura road were transferred to the railway at Haputale, it would assuredly give a large profit on the existing railway from Nanu Öya downwards.

6. That in corroboration of what your memorialists humbly submit as to the erroneous position taken up by the so-called Ceylon Agricultural Association, your memorialista would humbly ask your Lordship to read in connection with the railway proceedings and memorial of the said Association, and the speeches in the Legislative Council of the Tamil and Sinhalese representatives, the letter addressed to the Chairman and members of the Ceylon Agricultural Association by a member of that body, copy of which is herewith annexed, for ready reference by your Lordship, and your memorialists as in duty bound will ever pray.

* Enclosure 4 in No. 4.

† No. 4.

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