ABSTRACT
During the nineteenth century, Buddhists offered at least five faces to the British missionaries: hospitality and courtesy; willingness to engage in dialogue about religion, and to co-operate if mutual benefit was possible; a polite acceptance and tolerance that sometimes masked distrust or even contempt; the wish for reasoned, structured debate to prove the superiority of Buddhism and direct confrontation and opposition. All were present throughout the century, but in differing degrees. I will argue that the first three were dominant in the early years and the last two, in the later, the shift marking a watershed in the development of Sri Lankan Buddhism.
