ortunately,
whether through fraud or through misunderstanding, the priests who
were to have procured an authentic copy of the Pali originals and
translated them into the vernacular language, appear to have formed a
compilation of their own from various sources. The official
translators by whom this mutilated Singhalese abridgment was to have
been rendered into English, took still greater liberties; and the
'Sacred and Historical Books of Ceylon' had hardly been published
before Burnouf, then a mere beginner in the study of Pali, was able to
prove the utter uselessness of that translation. Mr. Turnour, however,
soon made up for this disappointment. He set to work in a more
scholarlike spirit, and after acquiring himself a knowledge of the
Pali language, he published several important essays on the Buddhist
canon, as preserved in Ceylon. These were followed by an edition and
translation of the Mahavansa, or the history of Ceylon, written in the
fifth century after Christ, and giving an account of the island from
the earliest times to the beginning of the fourth century A.D. Several
continuations of that history are in existence, but Mr. Turnour was
prevented by an early death from continuing his edition beyond the
original portion of that chronicle. The exploration of the Ceylonese
literature has since been taken up again by the Rev. D. J. Gogerly
(Clough), whose essays are unfortunately scattered about in Singhalese
periodicals and little known in Europe; and by the Rev. Spence Hardy,
for twenty years Wesleyan Missionary in Ceylon. His two works,
'Eastern Monachism' and 'Manual of Buddhism,' are full of interesting
matter, but as they are chiefly derived from Singhalese, and even more
modern sources, they require to be used with caution.[56]

[Footnote 56: The same author has lately published another valuable
work, 'The Legends and Theories of the Buddhists.' London, 1866.]

In the same manner as the Sanskrit originals of Nepal were translated
by Buddhist missionaries into Tibetan, Mongolian, and, as we shall
soon see, into Chinese and Mandshu,[57] the Pali originals of Ceylon
were carried to Burmah and Siam, and translated there into the
languages of those countries. Hardly anything has as yet been done for
exploring the literature of these two countries, which open a
promising field for any one ambitious to follow in the footsteps of
Hodgson, Csoma, and Turnour.

[Footnote 57: 'Melanges Asiatiques,' vol. ii. p. 373.