302 cook's first voyage dec. 



the landing-place, where there is depth of water 

 only for boats, which it completely commands, 

 with several large guns that make a very good ap- 

 pearance. 



Within this castle are apartments for the Governor- 

 general, and all the Council of India, to which they 

 are enjoined to repair in case of a siege. Here are 

 also large storehouses, where great quantities of the 

 Company's goods are kept, especially those that are 

 brought from Europe, and where almost all their 

 writers transact their business. In this place also 

 are laid up a great number of cannon, whether to 

 mount upon the walls or furnish shipping, we could 

 not learn ; and the Company is said to be well sup- 

 plied with powder, which is dispersed in various 

 magazines, that, if some should be destroyed by 

 lightning, which in this place is very frequent, the 

 rest may escape. 



Besides the fortifications of the town, numerous 

 forts are dispersed about the country to the distance 

 of twenty or thirty miles; these seem to have been 

 intended merely to keep the natives in awe, and in- 

 deed they are fit for nothing else. For the same 

 purpose a kind of houses, each of which mounts 

 about eight guns, are placed in such situations as 

 command the navigation of three or four canals, and 

 consequently the roads upon their banks: some of 

 these are in the town itself, and it was from one of 

 these that all the best houses belonging to the Chinese 

 were levelled with the ground in the Chinese rebellion 

 of 1740. These defences are scattered over all parts 

 of Java, and the other islands of which the Dutch 

 have got possession in these seas. Of one of these 

 singular forts, or fortified houses, we should have 

 procured a drawing, if our gentlemen had not been 

 confined by sickness almost all the time they were 

 upon the island. 



If the Dutch fortifications here are not formidable 

 in themselves, they become so by their situation : for 



