Dr. Mahes Ladduwahetty’s[ML] article [Island 9/2] on Winchester’s book displays commendable loyalty in attributing the author’s purple prose not to his own florid style, but to "contextual references…..[from] archival documents he had found". If only that was so, my criticism would not have a leg to stand on. Alas, Winchester anchors his Gauginesque scenes firmly in the present ! I quote from Chapter 3 "Ceylon IS in reality a kind of post-lapsarian treasure-island where every sensual gift of the tropics IS available, to reward temptation, and to beguile and charm….And there ARE the girls- young, chocolate-skinned naked girls with sleek wet bodies and rosebud nipples.

It was these nameless village girls – the likes of whom have frolicked naked in the Sinhalese surf for scores of years past AS THEY STILL DO NOW." I am afraid these are no "contextual references….from archival documents" but Winchester’s own work.

However, it is probable that his references to a Sinhalese Jaffna derive from Minor’s own confusion, typical of the fundamentalists who came to ‘Ceylon’ supremely ignorant of our ethnic varieties. To them, both Sinhalese and Tamils were indistinguishable brown heathens. In ML’s defence of Minor’s Faulty Geography and Demography, she states "Whether there was a Sinhalese presence in Manipay Jaffna, or whether there were 2 Manipays is something to be explored." Not much exploration is necessary. Both Census and Govt. Agent’s Reports of that period clearly indicate no such "Sinhalese presence in Manipay". Having lived and worked in both Jaffna and Trincomalee, I can vouch from personal knowledge and official records that the one and only Manipay is in Jaffna.