1770 CLIMATE—CROPS—CATTLE 387 
people here for the recovery of their health lost in the low 
country, and say that the effects of such a change of air is 
almost miraculous, working an instant change in favour of 
the patient, who during his stay there remains well, but no 
sooner returns to his necessary occupations at Batavia than 
his complaints return in just the same degree as before his 
departure. 
Few parts of the world, I believe, are better furnished 
with the necessaries as well as the luxuries of life, than the 
island of Java. The unhealthiness of the country about 
Batavia is in that particular rather an advantage to it; for 
the very cause of it, a low flat situation, is likewise the 
cause of a fruitfulness of soil hardly to be paralleled, which 
is sufficiently testified by the flourishing condition of the 
immense quantities of fruit-trees all round the town, as well 
as by the quantity and excellence of their crops of sugar- 
cane, rice, Indian corn, etc. etc. Indeed, the whole island is 
allowed to be uncommonly fruitful by those who have seen 
it, and in general as healthy as fruitful, excepting only such 
low fenny spots as the neighbourhood of Batavia, far fitter 
to sow rice upon than to build towns. 
The tame quadrupeds are horses, cattle, buffaloes, sheep, 
goats, and hogs. The horses are small, never exceeding in 
size what we call a stout Galloway, but nimble and spirited : 
they are said to have been found here when the Europeans 
first came round the Cape of Good Hope. The cattle are 
said to be the same as those in Europe, but differ from them 
in appearance so much that I am inclined to doubt. They 
have, however, the palearia, which naturalists make to be 
the distinguishing mark of our species. On the other hand, 
they are found wild, not only on Java, but on several of 
the eastern islands. The flesh of those that I ate at 
Batavia was rather finer-grained than European beef, but 
much drier, and always terribly lean. Buffaloes are very 
plentiful, but the Dutch are so much prejudiced against 
them, that they will not eat their flesh at all, nor even drink 
their milk, affirming that it causes fevers. The natives, 
however, and the Chinese do both, and have no such opinion 
