“A CEYLON CENTURY” – By Des Kelly

It was 1815, the British “took-over” the little Island of Ceylon, not because it was a huge mass of land in the middle of the Indian Ocean, not because it presented the English Sailors with yet another tropical Island wherein they could vent built-up passions of months at sea, not because they were, even then, singing “Rule, Britannia, Britannia rules the waves”, in fact it was a tiny little “dot” of an Island, & there were hundreds of other such “dots”where Sailors could have their “fun”, when “out on liberty”, most of them could not “sing” to save their souls, anyway & no one knew the “lyrics”.

Because I was fortunate enough to be born (much later), in Ceylon, I think I know that the main reason why Britain walked into ” My Lovely Island Home” was firstly, because of what was then, and still is now, I believe, 2 the largest NATURAL HARBOUR in the entire World, secondly, because the “Dutch” who were already there, preferred to build “Forts” everywhere, rather than fight, & thirdly, because, after the initial “landing”, these “Suddhas” realized that, in addition to the dozens of trees over there, producing “food”, practically ready to eat, all they had to do was “plant” their “walking-sticks” into the ultra-fertile soil of THIS Island to produce all the umbrellas to suffice the two monsoonal periods that happened annually. They were very happy, these Brits., to take over, what was soon to become the favourite Island of the very beautiful Queen Elizabeth the 2nd who, I believe, “visited” Ceylon, every chance she got.

Ceylon gained her independence in 1948. Once again, because I love this Country so very much, (their “Pollies”, all of them, can go jump into the Beira Lake, as far as I am concerned), I LOVE THE “COUNTRY” FOLKS, I am extremely fortunate to own collections of this precious memorabilia