306 By Stream and Sea. 



of Sumatra and Java. At first the E. and A. steamers called 

 at Batavia, or Sourabaya; but they have for some time 

 discontinued the practice. It did not pay ; the explanation 

 being really that which was once sent home from the Hague 

 by an official who, setting all the red-tapeism of the diplo- 

 matic service at defiance, wrote as his despatch— 



" In matters of commerce, the fault of the Dutch, 

 Is giving too little, and asking too much." 



In these latitudes all the devices which the knowing ones 

 have picked up in going to and fro on the earth, and walking 

 up and down in it, are put in force, if haply artificial currents 

 of air may be produced. The maids and matrons who have 

 hitherto scandalized steady family people, like ourselves, by 

 their flirtations. — and on board ship many women somehow 

 think they have a special license for this — are now so over- 

 come by the muggy heat that they lie languidly about on the 

 couches and chairs, thinking, let us hope, over their past 

 delinquencies. No one challenges you now to deck quoits, 

 or the classic game of bull ; the bores and the bounces, who 

 are to be found in every large steamship, are nearly, if not 

 altogether, extinguished, except in the morning, when, by the 

 rules of the establishment, they may appear on deck in airy 

 pyjama costume, and paddle about on the wet boards in 

 bare feet. But, hot or cold, wet or dry, in thunder, lightning, 

 or in rain, the propeller grinds on, and the Java Sea is 

 succeeded by the Flores Sea and its islands. By turning 

 through the Straits of Lombok, we, however, get southward 

 of that long line of islands which begins at Acheen Head, 

 includes Sumatra, Java, Bali, volcanic Lombok, Sumbawa, 

 and Flores, and finishes only with the Timor Group. 



So far as the close atmosphere will permit you to think, 



