40 Lift o/Sir Stainfoiil Raflles. 



quickly suppressed, and having thus successfully teiniiiiatetl the 

 war, he was at liberty to investigate the internal resources of the 

 island. This investigation he accordingly entered upon ; and he 

 also carefully examined the disposition and character of the in- 

 habitants, with a view equally to llie advancement of his country's 

 interests, and the moral improvenient of the natives and colonists. 

 One of the principal means he devised for the preliniinHry arrange- 

 ment of these and similar measures, was the reinstation of a literary 

 institution al Jiatavia, which had for some years been in a dormant 

 state. This subject requires particular notice. 



The first institution that was established by European colonists 

 in any of their Oriental settlements, for the purpose of obtaining 

 and communicating useful information on the surrounding objects 

 of inquiry, or of pursuing those branches of science or of literature 

 which might appear best calculated to promote the welfare of 

 their colonies, was the Batavian Society of Arts and Sciences. 

 This association was founded on the 24th of April, in the year 

 1778, through the exertions of M. lladermacher, a zealous pro- 

 moter of useful knowledge at Batavia, and son-in-law to the Dutch 

 Ciovernor-Ceneral iNl. JX' Klerk.* The objects of research first 



* The history of the U-arned societies formed in the FJuropean settlementa 

 in India, presents one of the many in-,tances of an example set by fo- 

 reigners, being followed and improved to an iiidefinite extent by our own 

 countr)nien. The first association lor the improvenient of natural knowledge 

 founded in Europe itself, was the Florentine Academia del Ciinenlo; the 

 second was the Royal Society of London. So also in the East, the Uatavian 

 Society as above staled, was the first institution established for the promotion 

 of inquiries into the history and learning of Asia; but the second was the 

 Asiatic Society of Calcutta, founded six years afterwards by Sir William 

 Jones. The seryicLS which the Asiatic Society has rendered to oriental 

 literature, arc too well known and appreciated to need remark in this place. 

 Within the present century, similar institutions have been formed at the prin- 

 cipal British residencies in Hindustan; as at Bombay, the Literary Society 

 (.f which settlcniciit has published three interesting volumes of transactions; 

 ai Madras; and in Ceylon. Even the distant southerly regions of New Holland 

 have the " Philosophical Society of Australasia," founded in 1H22 by Sir 

 'J'honias Brisbane, and the " Agricultural Society of V^an Dieman's Land." 

 These assorialions, in conjunction with the more recently established Asiatic 

 Societies of Paris and (Jreat Britain, furnish such vast means of investigation 

 ill Asia, as will probably change the face of Euslerii learning altogether. 



