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The Duke of Edinburgh and the Sinhalese beauty- by Hugh Karunanayake Source:Island Much has been written about the visit of Prince Alfred, the second son of Queen Victoria, the reigning monarch of the far flung British Empire, and his visit to Ceylon in 1870. Prince Alfred was 26 years of age at the time. In that day and age, a visit from a member of the British royal Family was something unusual and extraordinary. It was the age where “the sun never set on the British Empire”, whose monarch had supreme rights over the lives of the millions of her subjects. The impending visit by Prince Alfred to India and Ceylon among other countries of the British Empire had caused tremendous excitement, and plans were afoot many months in advance, to entertain the Prince in right royal fashion. The Governor of Ceylon at the time was Sir Hercules Robinson, formerly ...