[43] As yet there are no railroads on the island. But a company has been formed with the intention of uniting the more important and productive districts of the island, an enterprise which will extend to about 1000 miles (English), and will cost about £8,500,000.
[44] It is well known that Holland in former days recruited her black regiments of the Netherland Indies by men from the Gold Coast, and in fact had set on foot a sort of traffic in men with the king of Ashantee.
[45] Dr. Junghuhn, in his admirable work upon Java, describes the rainy season—which usually has fairly set in by the month of January, when the westerly and north-westerly winds are driving the rain-clouds before them—in the following spirited language:—"The floods stream from the clouds often for four-and-twenty hours at a stretch without the slightest interruption, and with such violence that the noise of the plash of the falling element drowns the voices of the inhabitants, compelled as they are to keep to their houses. Every brook and river overflows its banks, covering with a tide of muddy brown water the alluvial soil wrested from the bed of ocean, while the frogs croak incessantly day and night, and the lizards and snakes emerge from their holes, and creep into every corner of the dwellings of every man; all through the hours of darkness is heard the loud thousand-voiced hum of insects, of myriads of mosquitoes, till it is hardly possible to find a dry place throughout the house. The hot, sultry air is saturated with moisture, so that everything becomes damp, in consequence of the fine particles of the rain-vapour penetrating into the inmost corners of the house."
[46] Pronounced Chipannas (hot stream), from Tji, water, and Pannas, hot. Tji is always pronounced like chi, and oe like oo.
[47] One can form some idea of the enormous fecundity of this insect, if we mention that it takes 200,000 in a dried state to make one pound of the cochineal of commerce.
[48] Two Vanilla plants, imported in 1841 from the Botanical Garden of Leyden, remained barren for nine years, till recourse was at last had to the system of artificial fructification, upon which these plants increased so rapidly that the plants at present under cultivation at Pondok-Gedeh amount to 700,000!
[49] Now named Cankrienia Chrysantha. The plant most characteristic of this region was the gnaphalium arboreum.
[50] These four species were Cinchona Calisaya, C. Condanimea, C. Lanceolata, and C. Ovata.
[51] According to our latest advices from Java, which extend to November, 1860, there are at present in the Preanger Regency upwards of 100,000 China plants in the very best order, so that this valuable commodity not only may be regarded as fully naturalized in that island, but the Dutch Government even complied with the request of the British Government for a certain number of seedlings for introduction into India.
[52] Pronounce Tschipodas and Tschangschoor (Sweet Water) respectively.