422 SINGAPORE. 



market ; and if any suspicions fall upon him of mismanagement, he 

 is sure of the bastinado on his return. The consequence is, that 

 the king of Cochin-China is a successful merchant, grows rich on his 

 commercial speculations, and is always well served. The recompense 

 of the factor is but a small quantity of rice. 



Four or five of his ships resort annually to Singapore, loaded with 

 sugar, coffee, ivory, and many other articles of less importance, in 

 return for which they take British and India goods, fire-arms, iron, 

 glassware, &c. I have been informed that his success in trade has 

 been such that out of its profits within a year he has added a steamer 

 of six hundred tons to his navy. 



Almost every one has some idea of the external form of a Chinese 

 junk ; but the arrangement of the interior, although of great antiquity, 

 was new to us all. From the appearance of every thing on board, 

 the arrangements cannot have changed much in the lapse of many 

 centuries. The junks are of various sizes: the three that were visited 

 were from seventy-five to eighty feet in length, about twenty-two feet 

 beam, and about eighteen feet high forward, descending in a curve to 

 within three or four feet of the water amidships, and then again 

 rising in a like curve to the height of twenty -five feet. At the top of 

 the stern is the poop-cabin, with accommodations for the master, his 

 clerk, and the trader, in four small sleeping-rooms ; under these are 

 other cabins, with an eating apartment, and before this is a platform 

 or small deck, from which the vessel is steered. The rudder is an 

 extraordinary piece of wood, fully equal, in point of size, to that of 

 a line-of-battle ship. While in port it is always unshipped, and 

 drawn into the vessel on a small inclined slip or way. The junks 

 have usually two large masts, with a jigger, and there are no less 

 than three windlasses, which are used upon every occasion ; without 

 these the junks would really be almost unmanageable. In order to 

 preserve the vessel dry, they have waist-boards of solid thick plank, 

 which are unshipped in port ; these reach from the plank-sheer to the 

 rail, and from appearances effectually answer the purpose for which 

 they are intended. The cargo, however, was more interesting to us 

 than the vessel : this consisted chiefly of teas and china-ware ; the 

 latter, to our surprise, we found neatly and carefully stowed in bulk 

 in the hold. The lighter articles of Chinese manufacture are ar- 

 ranged about the vessel, and even hang over the poop and sides. 

 The wooden anchors, cables, grass ropes, odd and curious paintings, 

 the grotesque mode of external ornament, with the large eye on either 



