xxviii INTRODUCTION- 
for this circumvallation ; and that engagement 
was, at any rate, much better fulfilled than 
the preceding one. But was it not a fhame 
for a Government, poflefling immenfe forefts, 
to fend eight hundred leagues to folicit of a 
foreign power affiftance, which, without dif- 
ficulty and almoft without expence, it might 
have obtained by fea as well as by land from 
different parts of its own territories at home ? 
I have already publiflied fome reflections on . 
this fubjed: in the account of my firft tra- 
vels. On my return to Holland, I mentioned 
the circumftance to feveral of the directors of 
the company, and I have no doubt that fome 
plan wiil be adopted in confequence, which 
their own intereft at the fame time fo power- 
fully recommends*. 
* The ftate of things fmce thdfe lines were written 
has greatly changed ; it will, perhaps, change ftill more, 
and facilitate eftablifhments, which, by cuilom, felfifti- 
nefs, and tl-te interefl of partial afTociations, have long 
been retarded. 
4 As 
