296 
VOYAGE OF THE POTOMAC. 
[March, 
and his family ,took refuge in England, it was plainly perceived 
in Europe that the political troubles of the mother country must 
sooner or later very sensibly alfect the commercial interests of 
her colonies in the east. But they, luxurious and indolent, were 
the last to perceive the impending evil ; they forgot that the sun of 
their prosperity might not always remain unobscured by a cloud ; 
while their proud city seemed to say in her heart, "I sit as a 
.queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow" — until it came 
upon them like the suffocating sirocco of Syria, to the sudden 
prostration and almost total annihilation of their commerce. The 
roads of Batavia became nearly deserted by shipping, while trade 
and business of all kinds were at a complete stand, Popiilation 
declined in a corresponding ratio ; of which some idea may be 
formed from the fact, that in seventeen hundred and ninety-three, 
the city and immediate suburbs of Batavia contained, of all 
classes, a grand total of one hundred and fifteen thousand nine 
hundred and sixty souls ; while, by a census of eighteen hundred 
and fifteen, the whole population was less than sixty thousand. 
A more eligible site, in a commercial point of view, could not 
have been selected for the city of Batavia, than the one on which 
it stands ; nor could a werse one have been chosen on account 
of health. Towh9,tever section of the globe the Dutch emigrate, 
it has always been their endeavour to make the tastes and preju- 
dices of their faderland assimilate with the soil and climate of 
their new location. There were certainly some insurmountable 
obstacles to the indulgence of this propensity on the elevated 
banks of the Hudson ; but the temptation which presented itself 
on the low marshy shores of the Jacatra, in Java, proved to be 
irresistible. Here was a glorious opportunity for the display of 
.dikes and canals, and they eagerly seized upon the facilities. It 
was an extended level of rich alluvions land, with a copious river 
serpentining through it, with so indolent a current that it could be 
diverted from its original course, and conducted in any direction 
at pleasure. This river has its rise in the Blue Mountains, about 
fifty miles south of the bay, into which it empties; its mouth 
abounding with sharks and alligators, the latter having been known 
to upset boats, and devour the unfortunate inmates. 
The first operation of the colonists appears to have been to 
divide the stream of the Jacatra into two branches, sufficiently 
