to time as a militia, save to the public the expense of a regiment
or corps raised for the mere purpose of protecting the public stores and
the civil establishment of the colony.

Recruiting, therefore, in this colony for the Bengal army, being a
measure that required some consideration, and which the governor thought
should first have obtained the sanction of administration, he determined
to wait the result of a communication on the subject with the secretary
of state, before he gave it his countenance. At the same time he meant to
recommend it in a certain degree, as it was evident that many good
recruits might be taken, without any injury to the interests of the
settlement, from that class of our people who, being no longer prisoners,
declined labouring for government, and, without any visible means of
subsisting, lived where and how they chose.

The _Britannia_, in her passage to Batavia, anchored in Gower's Harbour,
New Ireland (on the 16th of July), where she completed her wood and
water, and sailed on the 23rd. On the 2nd of September following she
arrived at Batavia; and it appearing to Mr. Raven (as before observed)
but too probable that he should be detained by the government if he
ventured to wait even for their determination respecting supplying the
provisions, he sailed on the 7th for Bengal, arriving in the Ganges on
the 12th of October. Not being able to procure at Calcutta the full
quantity of provisions that his ship could contain, he sailed for Madras
on the 1st of February, where he anchored on the 15th. There he completed
his cargo, and sailed, with five homeward-bound Indiamen, on the 27th
of the same month. His passage to this country was long and tedious,
owing to the prevalence of light and contrary winds; but we were all well
pleased to be in possession of the comforts he brought us from that part
of the world, and to congratulate him on his personal escape from the
sickly and now inimical port of Batavia, as well as from the cruisers of
the enemy, with which he had reason to suppose he might fall in on the
Indian coast.

On his return from this his second voyage to India, Mr. Raven gave it as
his opinion, that the passage to be pursued from New South Wales to
India depended wholly upon the season in which the ship might leave Port
Jackson. From the month of November to April, or rather from October to
the beginning of March, which ought to be the latest period that any ship
should attempt a