298 



EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 



of wealthy merchants, mostly very poor and too proud to work ; there are some few, however, 

 who are emj^loyed as clerks in the various foreign mercantile houses, while the greater jiortion 

 spend their time in idleness, living upon the remnants of the once princely fortunes of their 

 ancestors, and still occupy, in beggarly poverty, the stately mansions erected in the olden time 

 of Macao's splendid prosperity. 



There is still a show of military possession on the part of the Portuguese, who hold the 

 surrounding liills, covering the city with fortified works, constructed after the fashion of the 

 seventeenth century. These seem quite sufficient to keep the Chinese in due awe, who, if 

 they had the least energy, could easily dislodge the Portuguese, for whom they have no great 

 affection, and might drive them altogether from the country. The Portuguese garrison consists 

 of about two hundred regular soldiers and as many local militia, all of whom are under excellent 

 discipline, and better dressed and more orderly men are seldom seen. 



It will be, perhajis, recollected that the English East India Company, before the abolition of 

 its charter, made Macao a sort of entrepot for its China trade, and some of the finest residences 

 were erected by that munificent corporation, or by the ostentatious Portuguese in their days of 

 wealth and prosperity. One of these magnificent dwellings, with a garden of more than an 

 acre in extent, tastefully laid out, and still kept in order at considerable cost, could be hired, at 



Protestant Grave Yard — Macao. 



the time of the Commodore's visit, for the small sum oi' five hundred dollars a year ; and this 

 place has the additional advantage of the romantic associatioii with the name of the poet 

 Camoens, it having been his favorite resort, and the spot upon which, as the reader has already 



