Although during our stay in Singapore the cholera had not alone carried off its victims in the town, but also in the harbour, especially in the screw corvette Niger, anchored in our immediate vicinity, which lost at the rate of about a man daily till she changed her moorings, and ultimately had to put to sea (which under such circumstances gives hope from the very first for a change for the better in the requisite sanitary conditions for restoring to health), yet the crew of the Novara seemed destined to escape the slightest evil effects from our six days' stay in this plague-stricken harbour. But the result did not justify these expectations. Five days after our departure from Singapore, just as we
were entering Gaspar Straits, one of the ship's boys fell ill with all the symptoms of the Asiatic pestilence, and two days after the man appointed to attend him was similarly seized. Every necessary precaution was taken, the crew were kept as much as possible on deck, the band played frequently, in order to keep up cheerfulness, and thus by great good fortune the malady was confined to the two individuals seized. The attendant ere long recovered, but the lad, after the choleraic symptoms had subsided, gradually fell into a typhoid state, under which, despite the utmost medical skill, he succumbed on the afternoon of May 4th. Owing to the rapidity with which decomposition sets in in organic structures in these hot latitudes, it was at once arranged that the body should be committed to the deep the same evening. It was the first occasion throughout the voyage that we had to perform this sad but most impressive ceremony. The officers and crew mustered on the deck. The body wrapped in an ensign lay upon a platform, close to the man-ropes on the starboard side. The chaplain prayed over the corpse of one so young, about to rest in the bosom of ocean far from friends and family, after which there was a dull hollow sound; the sea had got his prey, the waves closed with sullen glee over their booty,—and all was over!
In the course of the passage we also celebrated a funeral service on board for Austria's great, never-to-be-forgotten commander, Field-marshal Radetzky, of whose death we had
shortly before been apprized. As far as circumstances admitted, everything was done to celebrate this solemn duty in a befitting manner.
Several times during this part of our voyage, owing to the slight depth, averaging only 14 fathoms, of the Gaspar Strait, we observed sea-snakes basking on the surface of the sea, and letting the waves roll them lazily forward, several of which, about four feet long, were caught in a common insect-net.
At last, on the afternoon of May 5, we anchored in the roads of Batavia, in 6 1⁄2 fathoms, mud bottom. The aspect of the roads, especially in bad weather, is rather melancholy, the coast being low and swampy, and densely covered with mangrove-bushes, through which glittered a portion of the red-tiled roofs of the lower ancient city of Batavia, now abandoned on account of its insalubrity. Under a more cheerful sky the country round would of course assume a more agreeable and even imposing appearance, when the outline of the gigantic volcanoes of Java come into view in the background, with their heavenward towering peaks, partly covered with snow, permitting us to form some faint conception of the prodigality of Nature in this, the most beautiful island of the Malay Archipelago.
In the roads of Batavia we found much less bustle and animation than one could anticipate, considering the favourable situation and immense importance of the place. A short distance from us lay the Dutch frigate Palembang, carrying the
flag of a Vice-admiral, and the steam-corvette Gröningen, besides which we counted some sixty foreign merchantmen, and over a hundred native boats and coasting vessels. This rather small evidence of commercial activity is the more noticeable when one has just come from the free port of Singapore, where several hundred ships are always lying at anchor, sporting the flags of every sea-faring nation, without taking account of the almost innumerable Chinese and Malay coasters, trading between Singapore and the other islands of the Sunda Archipelago. Moreover, there are here no small boats plying to and fro, because the communications between the city and the roadstead being over a space requiring an hour and a half to traverse, the transit is necessarily dear, and remains therefore confined within as small limits as possible. For a small boat with two rowers from the roads to the landing-place the charge is from four to five florins (6s. 8d. to 8s. 4d.), and 3 1⁄2 florins (5s. 10d.) more for a vehicle to transport them to the town. For this reason no artisans, trades-people, or washerwomen will come off to where the shipping is at anchor, to take orders—every commission of whatever nature must be executed in the city itself. Here we lay at anchor, an Austrian frigate, surely a most unwonted visitant, from the afternoon till the following morning without one single boat coming off to visit us!
FOOTNOTES:
[27] City of Lions, from Singha, the Sanscrit for Lion, a title of Indian princes, which we again meet with in Singhala, the kingdom of Lions, as Ceylon is called in ancient records and histories.