100 CAPTAIN COOK'S VOYAGES 



the day time from the north, or north-west, and from 

 the south-west during the night. Previous to this there 

 had been violent thunder, and hard showers of rain for 

 several nights. 



The mosquitoes and gnats, whose company had been 

 sufficiently disagreeable in the dry weather, now began to 

 swarm in immense numbers, rising from the puddles of water 

 like bees from a hive. They were extremely troublesome 

 during the night, but the pain arising from their sting, 

 though very severe, seldom lasted more than half an 

 hour ; and in the day time they seldom made their attacks. 

 The frogs kept a perpetual croaking in the ditches ; a 

 certain sign that the wet season was commenced, and that 

 daily rain might be expected. 



The ship being repaired, the sick people being received on 

 board her, and the greater part of her water and stores 

 taken in, she sailed from Onrust on the 8th of December, 

 and anchored in the roads of Batavia. 



On the 24th, Captain Cook took leave of the governor, 

 and some other gentlemen, who had distinguished them- 

 selves by the civilities they showed him. Immediately 

 after, he went on board, attended by Mr. Banks and the 

 other gentlemen who had hitherto lived in the town, and 

 they got under sail the next morning. Since the arrival 

 of the ship in Batavia road, every person belonging to her 

 had been ill, except the sailmaker, who was more than 

 seventy years old ; yet this man got drunk every day 

 while they remained there 1 The Endeavour buried seven 

 of her people at Batavia, viz., Tupia, and his boy, three 

 sailors, the servant of Mr. Green, the astronomer, and the 

 surgeon ; and at the time of the vessel's sailing, forty of 

 the crew were sick, and the rest so enfeebled by their late 

 illness, as to be scarcely able to do their duty. 



The town of Batavia is situated in 6 10' S. lat., and 

 106 50' E. long., from the meridian of Greenwich. It is 

 built on the bank of a large bay, something more than 

 twenty miles from the Strait of Sunda, on the north side 

 of the island of Java, in low boggy ground. Several small 

 rivers, which rise forty miles up the country in the moun- 

 tains of Blaeuwen Berg, discharge themselves into the sea 

 at this place, having first intersected the town in different 

 directions. There are wide canals of nearly stagnated 

 water in almost every street, and as the banks of these 

 canals are planted with rows of trees, the effect is very 

 agreeable ; but these trees and canals combine to render 

 the air pestilential. 



They were informed that it was a very uncommon thing 

 for fifty soldiers, out of a hundred brought ^from Europe, to 



