There are no minerals except iron, no limestone except dolomite, no other rocks than quartz and gneiss.

The natural pastures are poor; the timber of the forests is the only natural production of any value, with the exception of cinnamon.

Sugar estates do not answer, and coffee requires an expensive system of cultivation by frequent manuring.

In fact, the soil is wretched; so bad that the natives, by felling the forest and burning the timber upon the ground, can only produce one crop of some poor grain; the land is then exhausted, and upon its consequent desertion it gives birth to an impenetrable mass of low jungle, comprising every thorn that can be conceived.

This deserted land, fallen again into the hand of Nature, forms the jungle of Ceylon; and as native cultivation has thus continued for some thousand years, the immense tract of country now in this impenetrable state is easily accounted for.