180 THE FOUNDING OF SINGAPORE. 



duly received; one of them in particular is dear to me from 

 many associations ; it is from the Painting which I so often 

 admired in the Drawing-room. 



Your account of our amiable and invaluable Prince has 

 given me the greatest satisfaction. He has indeed had his 

 trials, but that he is himself again proves him to-be of a higher 

 beiug than our ordinary natures. Volumes would not do 

 justice to his merits 01 his virtues, my heart overflows when 

 I think of him and of his sufferings, and though far removed 

 and separated from the passing scene, be assured I listen 

 with no common interest to all that is said of and about him. 



I have told you that Lady Raflies has presented me with 

 a son and a daughter ; from the circumstance of the latter 

 having been born on the voyage, the Javanese who are a poe- 

 tic people, wished her to be named Tunjung Segara, mean- 

 ing ' Lotos of the Sea,' and a more appropriate name for 

 purity or innocence could not have been conceived. I gra- 

 tified their wish, but at the same time my own, by prefixing 

 a more Christian and a more consecrated name " Charlotte "; 

 my son has been christened "Leopold"; and thus will "Leopold 

 and Charlotte'', be commemorated in my domestic circle, as 

 names ever dear and ever respected ; and that of my daughter 

 will be associated with the emblem of purity, handed down 

 in remembrance of one whose virtues and interests will never 

 be forgotten. 



I must not close this letter without giving you some 

 account of my occupations and views as far as they are of a 

 personal nature ; I am vain enough to hope that these will 

 interest }^ou more than all I could write of a public or 

 political nature. 



Notwithstanding the serious demands on my time arising 

 out of my public station, and the discussion I have naturally 

 had with the Dutch Authorities, I have been able to advance 

 very considerably in my collections in Natural History. 

 Sumatra does not afford any of those interesting remains 

 of former civilisation, and of the arts, which abound in Java. 

 Here man is far behind-hand, perhaps a thousand years even 

 behind his neighbour the Javanese ; but we have more origi- 

 nality, and the great volume of Nature has hardly been 

 opened. I was extremely unfortunate in the death of Dr. 

 Arnold, who accompanied me as a Naturalist from England, 

 he .fell a sacrifice to his zealous and indefatigable exertions 

 on the first journey he made into the interior; but not until 



