SOUTHERN AFRICA. 271 
" vio-ation of the Straits of Sunda and Malacca. Our Asiatic 
" possessions, commerce, and marine, would consequently lie 
" open to the depredations of the masters of Cejlon .... Ad- 
" mitting then that Ceylon should preponderate, if put into 
" the scale against the Cape, let it not be forgotten, however, 
" that the Cape in an enemy's hands may become a pozaerful in- 
" strument for their recovering Ceylon!' 
There can l)e no question that the French had previously 
decided on the relative importance of these two settlements 
which had been taken from their ally ; and that they were 
extremely glad we gave up that which was considered as the 
worse, under the idea of its being an instrument in their 
hands which miojht enable them to take from us the better. 
Ceylon to them was of no great value. It furnishes no sup- 
plies for an army or a navy, and would always be at the mercy 
of that power which could bring a superior fleet into the 
Indian Seas ; and we have shewn that no such fleet of an 
enemy could be assembled there, nor victualled, nor pro- 
visioned, whilst the Cape of Good Hope remained a British 
colony. It would seem then to have been a more desirable 
object to retain possession of that station which would effectu- 
ally have excluded them from the Indian Seas ; and wliicli 
would have enabled us to confine them to their useless islands 
of France and Bourbon. 
Of one thing England may be well assured, that the destruc- 
tion of its commerce, as the source from whence its povv'er and 
affluence are derived, is a sentiment so deeply rooted in the 
mind of the Corsican that, so long as it continues to tloarish. 
