378 DESCRIPTION OF BATAVIA CHAP, xvn 



streets increased by their canals, make it impossible to com- 

 pare it with any English town. All I can say is that when 

 seen from the top of a building, from whence the eye takes it 

 in at one view, it does not look nearly so large as it seems 

 to be when you walk about it. Valentijn, who wrote about 

 and before the year 1726, says that in his time there were 

 within the walls 1242 Dutch houses, and 1200 Chinese; 

 without, 1066 Dutch and 1240 Chinese, besides twelve 

 arrack houses. This number, however, appeared to me to be 

 very highly exaggerated, those within the walls especially. 

 But of all this I confess myself a very indifferent judge, hav- 

 ing enjoyed so little health, especially towards the latter part 

 of my stay, that I had no proper opportunity of satisfying 

 myself in such particulars. 



The streets are broad and handsome, and the banks of 

 the canals in general planted with rows of trees. A stranger 

 on his first arrival is very much struck with these, and often 

 led to observe how much the heat of the climate must be 

 tempered by the shade of the trees and coolness of the water. 

 Indeed, as to the first, it must be convenient to those who 

 walk on foot; but a very short residence will show him 

 that the inconveniences of the canals far over-balance any 

 convenience he can derive from them in any but a mercan- 

 tile light. Instead of cooling the air, they contribute not a 

 little to heat it, especially those which are stagnant, as most 

 of them are, by reflecting back the fierce rays of the sun. In 

 the dry season these stink most abominably, and in the wet 

 many of them overflow their banks, filling the lower storeys 

 of the houses near them with water. When they clean them, 

 which is very often, as some are not more than three or four 

 feet deep, the black mud taken out is suffered to lie upon the 

 banks, that is, in the middle of the street, till it has acquired 

 a sufficient hardness to be conveniently laden into boats. 

 This mud stinks intolerably. Add to this that the running 

 water, which is in some measure free from the former incon- 

 veniences, has every now and then a dead horse or hog 

 stranded in the shallow parts, a nuisance which I was in- 

 formed no particular person was appointed to remove. I 



