542 rOURTH BULLETIN OF [1846. 



February, 1845. — Singapore is rapidly rising to a larfre cily, and may well be 

 styled the key of the Gulf of Siam and tiie China Sea. It. is situated on an island 

 of an elliptical form, twenty-five -o twenty-seven miles in its greatest breadth from 

 north to south, anl containing an estimated area ol two Iiundred and seventy 

 square miles, with about fifty small desert isles within ten miles around it, in the 

 adjacent straits, whose area is about sixty milus, the whole sottlemont embracing a 

 mi'.ritime and insular dominion of about one hundred miles in circumference. The 

 island is, on the north, separated from the main land of the Malayan peninsula by 

 a very small strait, which in its narrowest part is not more than a quarter of a 

 mile wide ; on the front, and distant about ton miles, is an extensive chain of almost 

 desert isles, the channel between which and Singapore is the ^rand route of com- 

 merce between Europe and America and western Asia! The aspect is low and 

 level, with an extensive chain of saline and frt-.-^h water marshes in several parts, 

 covered with lofty timber and luxuriant vegetation, liero and tliere low rounded 

 sand hills, interspersed with spots of level ground, formed of a ferruginous clay 

 with a sandy substratum. 



The principal rock is red sand-stone, which changes in some parts to a breccia 

 or conglomerate, containing large fragments and crystals of quartz. 



The >■. hole contiguous group of isles, about tliirty in number, as well as Singa- 

 pore, are apparently of a submarine origin, and their evulsion probably of no very 

 distant date. 



Oii several ol the small islands of the strait are fine quarries of syenite, which 

 are worked by tlie Chinese, and used for most of the buildings now being construct, 

 ed in Singopore. 



The town stands on the south coast, on a point of land near the west end of a 

 bay, where lliere is a salt creek or river navigable for lighters, nearly a mile from 

 the sea ; on tlie east side of the town is a deep inlet for the shelter of native boats. 

 Tlie town consis'< generally of stone houses of two stories high, but in the suburbs, 

 called Campong Glam, (Campong, Malacca, and Glam, Cliina,) bamboo huts are 

 erected on posts, most of them standing in the stagnant water on the east side of 

 the harbor. Enterprising mercliants irve erected tnaiiy substantial and ornamental 

 houses fronting the harbor, and presenting a strange contrast with the wretched 

 tenements of the natives. The ground is generally raised threefeet, and they have 

 an elegant entrance by an ascent of granite stairs. The rooms are lofty, with 

 Venetian windows down to the floor, and many are furnished in a luxuriant manner, 

 with baths, &c., while the grounds are tastily laid out with -hrubs of beautiful 

 foliage, aSbrdmg a most picturesque prospect from the shipping in the harbor. 



On the design of Sir Stanford Raffles, the settlement of Singapore was first formed 

 in February, 1818, and declared a free port in 1819, and its sovereignty, in its pre- 

 sent extent, confirmed to Great Britain in 1825, by a convention with the King of 

 Hollarn! and the Malay Princes of Johore. There is, it is said, a pension of 

 §24,000 bpanish, a year, paid by the East India Company to this Rajah as an equiva- 

 lent for tlio cession. In 1823, the town consisted of only a few buildings, but it now 

 can boast of the handsomest, most legular, and best built bazaar, it is said, in In- 

 dia. The shops and houses (upper stories) are all pukka, uniform, neat, and re- 

 spectable, with fine wide elreol3,.and are occupied solely by Chinese, who carry on 

 the business of the placs, not excepting commercial speculations, as their houses 

 are full of goods, and they themselves are in a thriving condition. 



Singapore was down to tlie year 1818 a haunt of pirates; no European or nativo 

 vessels ever visited it, and as late as the year 1810 the boats of the English frigate 

 Greyhound cut out and recaptured from one of the most secure spots of the present 

 harbor a European vessel which had fallen into the hands of the pirates in question. 



The population of Singapore is, at present, computed at more than sixty thousand, 

 two-thirds of which are Chinese, and the remainder Malays, Hindoos, and foreigners. 



During our stay there of five weeks more than seven thousand Chinese arrived as 

 settlers, but it was the proper season forthearrival of thoir junks, as they are obliged 

 to come down near the termination of the northeast monsoon, not being able to beat 

 against an adverse wind with their ill constructed vessels. Upwards of forty of 

 these vessels were Iving in the harbor, some of six hundred weight tonnage. 



Notwithstanding its lowncis, marshiness, intertropical positiim, and consequent 

 high temperature, with a conslaut and rapid evaporation by a nearly vertical eun, 

 from a rank and luxuriant vegetation and a profusion of animal and vegetable mat- 



