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commerce to the Persian and Arabian gulphs, the coast of Africa, 
Malacca, China, and the eastern islands. 
Bombay is situated in the latitude of 18° 50' north, and 73° of 
east longitude from London: the island does not exceed twenty 
miles in circumference: and being entirely surrounded by the sea, 
the heat is seldom oppressive, and the climate in general healthy 
and pleasant, and the inhabitants are strangers to the hot winds so 
troublesome on the continent. The surface of the soil is very un- 
equal, consisting of rocks, hills, and plains; except in one part, 
where a very considerable tract is overflowed by the encroachment 
of the sea, notwithstanding a very strong wall which was erected 
at a great expense to prevent it. 
From being situated only a few miles from the Mahratta 
shores, and still nearer the fertile island of Salselte, the markets 
are daily supplied from thence with all the necessaries of life: for 
so circumscribed, so rocky, and so unequal is the surface of Bom- 
bay itself, that it only produced a sufficiency of grain in one year, 
to supply its population for six wrecks. Yet each spot that will 
admit of cultivation, and is not occupied by houses, is sown with 
rice, or planted with cocoa-nut trees; which, in extensive woods, 
lend their friendly shade to thousands of neat cottages, and form 
delightful rides, impervious to a tropical sun. 
Of all the gifts which Providence has bestowed on the 
oriental world, the cocoa-nut tree most deserves our notice: in 
this single production of nature, what blessings are conveyed to 
man! It grows in a stately column, from thirty to fifty feet in 
height, crowned by a verdant capital of waving branches, covered 
with long spiral leaves; under this foliage, bunches of blossoms, 
