have the power of exerting in those regions;
how great a blessing they might prove to thousands and thousands of
their fellow-creatures, if they acted in accordance with the divine
precepts of Christianity, and as civilised and enlightened men should
act. Surely, if they do not, their kingdom will be taken from them and
given to another.

The evening of our arrival, Fairburn and I drove out to see the city and
its environs, in a sort of caleche, drawn by two ponies, and driven by a
Javanese boy, in a round japanned hat, like a china punch-bowl. The
roads are lined on either side with fine avenues of trees arching
overhead. We passed numerous villages, or kampongs as they are called,
and many country houses, of good size, lighted up with lamps. In front
of most of them were parties of ladies and gentlemen drinking coffee or
wine, or smoking, or chatting, or playing at cards. We met several
carriages with ladies in them in full dress, passed over numerous wooden
bridges, and were much struck with the brilliant fire-flies which were
flitting about among the trees. On re-entering the town, we passed
large arched gateways leading to particular quarters, and remarked in
that inhabited by the Chinese, the grotesque-looking houses, lit up with
large paper-lanterns, of gaudy colours, and Chinese inscriptions or
monsters on them, and the long rows of Chinese characters up and down
the door-posts, or over the windows. After the quiet of the sea, our
senses were confused by the strange cries, and the Babel of languages
which resounded in our ears from the crowds of people who swarmed along
the streets in every variety of Eastern dress. There was the half-naked
coolie; the well-clothed Citinese, in a loose white coat, like a
dressing-gown; the Arab merchant, in his flowing robes; and the Javanese
gentleman, in smart jacket and trousers, sash and sarong, or petticoat,
a curious penthouse-like hat or shade, and a strange-handled kriss stuck
in his girdle. We could scarcely help laughing, when in our drive we
met our corpulent Chinese gentleman, in a white dressing-gown-looking
affair, smooth head, and a long pigtail, weighing down one side of a
very English-looking little pony gig, driven by a smart Javanese boy,
with the usual china punch-bowl worn by postilions, on his head. The
Chinese flock here, as they do everywhere in the East, where money is to
be made, in spite of all obstacles; and numbers of coolies, or porters,