SINGAPORE. 
379 
sociable and agreeable, but is necessarily small, being confined to but 
sixty or seventy individuals. 
The island of Singapore is composed of red clay, sandstone, and 
in some places granite. The locality of the town appears to have 
been a salt-marsh, with a narrow strip of rocks and sand near the 
beach. In consequence of its rapid increase, they are beginning now 
to fill up the low ground with the surplus earth taken from the sur¬ 
rounding hills. 
The highest point of Singapore is called Buhit Tima, and does not 
excee'd, it is said, five hundred feet in elevation. Although this height 
is but seven miles distant from the town, I was told it has never yet 
been visited by a European and seldom by natives, on account of the 
obstructed nature of the intervening country; there are a few small 
fishing or piratical establishments (the two names are synonymous 
here, for when the people are not engaged in the one, they are in the 
other), on the north and west end of the island. The length of the 
island is twenty-seven miles, and its greatest breadth is fifteen. It is 
divided from the peninsula by the old strait of Singapore, so long 
followed by navigators, for reasons it is now difficult to surmise, when 
the short, wide, and safe channel was open to them, which is now 
altogether used. 
The botany of Singapore is far from being thoroughly known, not¬ 
withstanding so many scientific expeditions have visited it; nor is it 
likely to become so very soon, infested as the woods are with tigers. 
It is remarkable that before the island was inhabited, tigers did not 
exist in it, although there were great numbers of them in the peninsula 
opposite ; and it is said that they have only made their appearance 
here within the last six or seven years. Indeed, one of the reasons 
assigned for its selection, was the absence of this ferocious animal, and 
of the wild elephant. It is to be presumed, therefore, that the tigers 
come in search of food, by swimming over the narrow straits. Some 
fifty persons have been killed by them within the last two years, within 
two miles of the centre of the town, and two hundred in all are reported 
as having become victims to these beasts. Criminals and thieves were 
formerly in the habit of escaping to the woods or jungle, but of late 
years this has not been attempted by them. 
The government, in consequence of the attacks of tigers becoming 
so frequent, and of the jungle being so much infested by them, offered 
a premium of one hundred dollars for every tiger’s head that should 
be brought in. This induced large parties to hunt them; but, since 
the government have reduced the reward to fifty dollars, this daring 
business has not been followed; not, however, from any scarcity of 
