3 88 DESCRIPTION OF BATAVIA CHAP, xvn 



concerning them. Their sheep, of that sort whose ears hang 

 down and have hair instead of wool, are most intolerably bad, 

 lean, and tough to the last degree. They have, however, a 

 few Cape sheep, which are excellent, though intolerably dear. 

 "We gave 2 : 5s. a piece for four, which we bought for sea 

 stock, the heaviest of which weighed only 45 Ibs. Their 

 goats are much of a par with their sheep, but their hogs 

 are certainly excellent, especially the Chinese, which are so 

 immensely fat that nobody thinks of buying the fat with 

 the lean. The butcher, when you buy it, cuts off as much 

 as you please, and sells it to his countrymen, the Chinese, 

 who melt it down and eat it instead of butter with their 

 rice. Notwithstanding the excellence of this pork, the 

 Dutch are so prejudiced in favour of everything which 

 comes from the Fatherland, that they will not eat it at all, 

 but use entirely the Dutch breed, which are sold as much 

 dearer than the Chinese here, as the Chinese are dearer than 

 them in Europe. 



Besides these domestic animals, their woods afford some 

 wild horses and cattle, but only in the distant mountains, 

 and even there they are very scarce. Buffaloes are not 

 found wild upon Java, though they are upon Macassar, 

 and are numerous in several of the eastern islands. The 

 neighbourhood of Batavia, however, is pretty plentifully 

 supplied with deer of two kinds, and wild hogs, both which 

 are very good meat, and often shot by the Portuguese, who 

 sell them tolerably cheap. Monkeys also there are, though 

 but few in the neighbourhood of Batavia. 



On the mountains and in the more desert part of the 

 island are tigers, it is said, in too great abundance, and some 

 rhinoceroses ; but neither of these animals are ever heard of 

 in the neighbourhood of Batavia, or indeed any in well-peopled 

 part of the island. 



Fish are in immense plenty ; many sorts of them very 

 excellent and inconceivably cheap ; but the Dutch, true to 

 the dictates of luxury, buy none but those which are scarce. 

 We, who in the course of our long migration in the warm 

 latitudes had learned the real excellence of many of the 



