between the 25th and 26th, such rain as we had seldom seen, for near four hours without intermission. Mr Banks's house admitted the water in every part like a sieve, and it ran through the lower rooms in a stream that would have turned a mill: He was by this time sufficiently recovered to go out, and upon his entering Batavia the next morning, he was much surprised to see the bedding every where hung out to dry.

The wet season was now set in, though we had some intervals of fair weather. The frogs in the ditches, which croak ten times louder than any frogs in Europe, gave notice of rain by an incessant noise that was almost intolerable, and the gnats and musquitos, which had been very troublesome even during the dry weather, were now become innumerable, swarming from every plash of water like bees from a hive; they did not, however, much incommode us in the day, and the stings, however troublesome at first, never continued to itch above half an hour, so that none of us telt in the day the effects of the wounds they had received in the night.

On the 8th of December, the ship being perfectly refitted, and having taken in most of her water and stores, and received the sick on board, we ran up to Batavia Road, and anchored in four fathom and a half of water."

From this time, to the 24th, we were employed in getting on board the remainder of our water and provisions, with some new pumps, and in several other operations that were necessary to fit the ship for the sea, all which would

have

have been effected much sooner, if sickness and death had not disabled or carried off a great number of our men.

While we lay here, the Earl of Elgin, Captain Cook, a ship belonging to the English East India Company, came to anchor in the road. She was bound from Madras to China, but having lost her passage, put in here to wait for the next season. The Phoenix, Captain Black, an English country ship, from Bencoolen, also came to an anchor at this place.

In the afternoon of Christmas-eve, the 24th, I took leave of the governor, and several of the principal gentlemen of the place, with whom I had formed connexions, and from whom I received every possible civility and assistance; but in the mean time an accident happened which might have produced disagreeable consequences. A seaman had run away from one of the Dutch ships in the road, and entered on board of mine: The captain had applied to the governor to reclaim him as a subject of Holland, and an order for that purpose was procured: This order was brought to me soon after I returned from my last visit, and I said, that if the man appeared to be a Dutchman, he should certainly be delivered up. Mr Hicks commanded on board, and I gave the Dutch officer an order to him to deliver the man up under that condition. I slept myself this night on shore, and in the morning the captain of the Dutch commodore came and told me that he had carried my order on board, but that the officer had refused to deliver up the man, alleging not only that he was not a Dutchman, but that he was a subject of Great Britain, born in Ireland; I replied, that the officer had perfectly executed my orders, and that if the man was an English subject, it could not be expected that I should deliver him up. The captain then said, that he was just come from the governor to demand the man of me in his name, as a subject of Denmark, alleging that he stood in the ship's books as born at Elsineur. The claim of this man as a subject of Holland being now given up, I observed to the captain that there appeared to be some mistake in the general's message, for that he would certainly never demand a Danish seaman from me who had committed no other crime than preferring the service of the English to that of the Dutch. I added, however, to convince him of my sincere desire to avoid disputes, that if the man was a Dane, he should be delivered up as a courtesy, though

he

he could not be demanded as a right; but that if I found he was an English subject, I would keep him at all events. Upon these terms we parted, and soon after I received a letter from Mr Hicks, containing indubitable proof that the seaman in question was a subject of his Britannic majesty. This letter I immediately carried to the shebander, with a request that it might be shewn to the governor, and that his excellency might at the same time be told I would not upon any terms part with the man. This had the desired effect, and I heard no more of the affair.?

In the evening I went on board, accompanied by Mr Banks, and the rest of the gentlemen who had constantly resided on shore, and who, though better, were not yet perfectly recovered.

At six in the morning of the 26th, we weighed and set sail, with a light breeze at S.W. The Elgin Indiaman saluted us with three cheers and thirteen guns, and the garrison with fourteen, both which, with the help of our swivels, we returned, and soon after the sea-breeze set in at N. by W., which obliged us to anchor just without the ships

in the road.

At this time the number of sick on board amounted to forty, and the rest of the ship's company were in a very feeble condition. Every individual had been sick except the sail-maker, an old man between seventy and eighty years of age; and it is very remarkable, that this old man, during our stay at this place, was constantly drunk every day: We had buried seven, the surgeon, three seamen,

Mr Green's

7 Whatever may be thought of the advantage of such policy, it is certain that Cook acted here in the full spirit of a British officer and minister. Every reader must be aware how materially the same determination on the part of our government has tended to embroil us with the Americans, betwixt whom and us, the question of fact, as to country, is often much more difficult of solution than it can well be where any other people oppose our claims.-E.

8 Cases similar to this are of constant occurrence, and are familiarly known to medical men who have a principle to account for it. The conti nual operation of exciting causes so as to produce a certain degree of ac tion of the system, will prevent, as well as remedy, diseases of debility. The plague has been kept off by a like treatment on the same principle, and so has the ague, an intermitting fever so formidable in some countries. Giving over or abating of this stimulating treatment, however, if other circumstances remain the same, will, of course, render the person as obnoxious as ever to attack, or rather more so. It is evident that at times this cure is as bad as the disease; for scarcely any state of health is more deplorably fatal than constant drunkenness.-E.

Mr Green's servant, Tupia, and Tayeto, his boy. All but Tupia fell a sacrifice to the unwholesome, stagnant, putrid air of the country, and he who, from his birth, had been used to subsist chiefly upon vegetable food, particularly ripe z fruit, soon contracted all the disorders that are incident to a sea life, and would probably have sunk under them before we could have completed our voyage, if we had not been obliged to go to Batavia to refit.

SECTION XXXVIII.

Some Account of Batavia, and the adjacent Country; with their Fruits, Flowers, and other Productions.

BATAVIA, the capital of the Dutch dominions in India, and generally supposed to have no equal among all the possessions of the Europeans in Asia, is situated on the north side of the island of Java, in a low fenny plain, where several small rivers, which take their rise in the mountains called Blaeuwen Berg, about forty miles up the country, empty themselves into the sea, and where the coast forms a large bay, called the Bay of Batavia, at the distance of about eight leagues from the streight of Sunda. It lies in latitude 6° 10′ S., and longitude 106° 50′ E. from the meridian of Greenwich, as appears from astronomical observations made upon the spot, by the Rev. Mr Mohr, who has built an elegant observatory, which is as well furnished with instru ments as most in Europe.'

The Dutch seem to have pitched upon this spot for the convenience of water-carriage, and in that it is indeed a second Holland, and superior to every other place in the

world.

* Batavia, called by some writers, the Queen of the East, on account of its wealth and the beauty of its buildings, is situate very near the sea, in a fertile plain, watered by the river Jaccatra, which divides the town. The sea-shore is on the north of the city; and on the south the land rises with a very gentle slope to the mountains, which are about fifteen leagues inland. One of these is of great height, and is called the Blue Mountain. The early history of this city is given in the tenth volume of the Modern Universal History, to which the reader is referred for information which it would perhaps be tedious to detail in this place. Batavia, the reader will easily imagine, has been much impaired by the calamities of her European parent; but, indeed, for some considerable time before they com menced, she had very materially declined in consequence and power.-E.

world. There are very few streets that have not a canal of considerable breadth running through them, or rather stagnating in them, and continued for several miles in almost every direction beyond the town, which is also intersected by five or six rivers, some of which are navigable thirty or forty miles up the country. As the houses are large, and the streets wide, it takes up a much greater extent, in proportion to the number of houses it contains, than any city in Europe. Valentyn, who wrote an account of it about the year 1726, says, that in his time there were, within the walls, 1242 Dutch houses, and 1200 Chinese; and without the walls, 1066 Dutch, and 1240 Chinese, besides 12 arrack houses, making in all 4760: But this account appeared to us to be greatly exaggerated, especially with respect to the number of houses within the walls.

The streets are spacious and handsome, and the banks of the canals are planted with rows of trees, that make a very pleasing appearance; but the trees concur with the canals to make the situation unwholesome. The stagnant canals in the dry season exhale an intolerable stench, and the trees impede the course of the air, by which, in some degree, the putrid effluvia would be dissipated. In the wet season the inconvenience is equal, for then these reservoirs of corrupted water overflow their banks in the lower part of the town, especially in the neighbourhood of the hotel, and fill the lower stories of the houses, where they leave behind them an inconceivable quantity of slime and filth: Yet these canals are sometimes cleaned; but the cleaning them is so managed as to become as great a nuisance as the foulness of the water; for the black mud that is taken from the bottom is suffered to lie upon the banks, that is, in the middle of the street, till it has acquired a sufficient degree of hardness to be made the lading of a boat, and carried away. As this mud consists chiefly of human ordure, which is regularly

thrown

2 The river Jaccatra, as has been mentioned, runs through the city, viz. from south to north, and having three bridges, one near the castle, at the lower end, another at the upper end, and the third about the centre of the town. It is from 160 to 180 feet broad, within the city, and is fortified, though indifferently, at its mouth, which, however, is of less importance, as a continually-increasing bar renders access to the city by it impracticable for large vessels.-E.

3 Some of the streets are paved, but they consist of a hard clay which allows of being made plain and smooth; and within the city there are stone foot paths along their sides.-- E.