334 cook's first voyage dec. 



pose but at the most exorbitant price. The Chinese, 

 however, contrive to raise the purchase-money, and 

 afford another instance of the folly and weakness of 

 human nature, in transferring a regard for the living 

 to the dead, and making that the object of solicitude 

 and expence, which cannot receive the least benefit 

 from either. Under the influence of this universal 

 prejudice, they take an uncommon method to pre- 

 serve the body entire, and prevent the remains of it 

 from being mixed with the earth that surrounds it. 

 They inclose it in a large thick coffin of wood, not 

 made of planks joined together, but hollowed out of 

 the solid timber like a canoe ; this being covered, 

 and let down into the grave, is surrounded with a 

 coat of their mortar, called Chinam, about eight or 

 ten inches thick, which in a short time becomes as 

 hard as a stone. The relations of the deceased 

 attend the funeral ceremony, with a considerable 

 number of women that are hired to weep: it might 

 reasonably be supposed that the hired appearance of 

 sorrow could no more flatter the living than benefit 

 the dead : yet the appearance of sorrow is known to 

 be hired among people much more reflective and en- 

 lightened than the Chinese. In Batavia, the law 

 requires that every man should be buried according 

 to his rank, which is in no case dispensed with ; so 

 that, if the deceased has not left sufficient to pay his 

 debts, an officer takes an inventory of what was in 

 his possession when he died, and out of the produce 

 buries him in the manner prescribed, leaving only 

 the overplus to his creditors. Thus in many in- 

 stances are the living sacrificed to the dead, and 

 money that should discharge a debt, or feed an or- 

 phan, lavished in idle processions, or materials that 

 are deposited in the earth to rot. 



Another numerous class among the inhabitants of 

 this country is the slaves ; for by slaves the Dutch, 

 Portuguese, and Indians, however, different in their 

 rank or situation, are constantly attended : they are 



