On the 28th a fleet of more than an hundred sail of the small country vessels, called proas, anchored here; their burden is from twelve to eighteen and twenty tons, and they carry from sixteen to twenty men. I was told that they carried on a fishery round the island, going out with one monsoon, and coming back with the other, so as always to keep under the lee of the land: The fish was sent to the China market, and I observed that all these vessels carried Dutch colours.
No event worthy of notice happened till the 18th of January, and then I learnt by a letter from Macassar that the Dolphin had been at Batavia. On the 28th, the secretary of the council, who had been sent hither with Le Cerf, as we supposed to be a check upon the resident, was called to Macassar. By this time our carpenter, having in a great degree recovered his health, examined the state of our vessel, and to our great regret she appeared to be very leaky: Our main yard also was found not only to be sprung, but to be rotten and unserviceable. We got it down and patched it up as well as we could, without either iron or a forge, so that we hoped it would serve us till we got to Batavia, for no wood was to be procured here of which a new one could be made. To our leaks very little could be done, and we were therefore reduced to an entire dependence upon our pumps.
On Friday the 19th of February, Le Cerf, the military officer who commanded the soldiers on shore, was recalled, as it was said, to fit out an expedition for the island of Bally; on the 7th of March, the largest of our guard-boats, a sloop about forty-five tons, was ordered back to Macassar with part of the soldiers; and on the 9th, the resident, Mr Swellingrabel, received a letter from the governor of that place, enquiring when I should sail for Batavia. I must confess, that I was surprised at the recal of the officer, and the guard boat; but I was much more surprised at the contents of the governor's letter, because he knew that it was impossible I should sail till May, as the eastern monsoon would not sooner set in. All matters, however, remained in the same situation till near the end of the month, when some of my people took notice, that for a short time past a small canoe had gone round us several times at different hours of the night, and had disappeared as soon as those on board perceived any body stirring in the ship. On the 29th, while these things were the subjects of speculation, one of my officers who came from the shore brought me a letter, which he said had been delivered to him by a black man: It was directed, "To the Commander of the English ship at Bonthyn." That the reader may understand this letter, it is necessary to acquaint him, that the island of Celebes is divided into several districts, which are distinct sovereignties of the native princes. The town of Macassar is in a district called also Macassar, or Bony, the king of which is in alliance with the Dutch, who have been many times repulsed in an attempt to reduce other parts of the island, one of which is inhabited by a people called Buggueses, and another is called Waggs or Tosora. The town of Tosora is fortified with cannon, for the natives had been long furnished with fire-arms from Europe, before the Dutch settled themselves at Macassar in the room of the Portuguese.
The letter acquainted me, that a design had been formed by the Dutch, in conjunction with the king of Bony, to cut us off: That the Dutch, however, were not to appear in it: That the business was to be done by a son of the king of Bony, who was, besides a gratuity from the Dutch, to receive the plunder of the vessel for his reward, and who, with eight hundred men, was then at Bonthain for that purpose: That the motive was jealousy of our forming a connection with the Buggueses, and other people of the country, who were at enmity with the Dutch and their allies, and driving them out of the island; or at least a suspicion that, if we got back to England, some project of that kind might be founded upon the intelligence we should give, no English man-of-war, as I have already observed, having ever been known to have visited the island before.
This letter was a new subject of surprise and speculation. It was extremely ill written with respect to the style and manner, yet it did not therefore the less deserve notice. How far the intelligence which it contained was true or false, I was utterly unable to determine: It was possible that the writer might be deceived himself; it was also possible that he might have some view in wilfully deceiving me: The falsehood might procure some little reward for the kindness and zeal which it placed to his account, or it might give him an importance which would at least be a gratification to his vanity. It behoved me, however, to take the same measures as if I had known it to be true; and I must confess, that I was not perfectly at ease when I recollected the recal of the Secretary and Le Cerf, with the large sloop, and part of the soldiers, who were said to have been sent hither for no other reason than to guard us against the insults of the country people; the assembling an armed force at Macassar, as it was said, for an expedition to Bally; and the little canoe that we had seen rowing round us in the night, not to mention the governor's enquiry by letter, when we intended to leave the island. However, whether either our intelligence or conjectures were true or false, we immediately went to work: We rigged the ship, bent the sails, unmoored, got springs upon our cables, loaded all our guns, and barricadoed the deck. At night every body slept under arms, and the next day we warped the vessel farther off from the bottom of the bay, towards the eastern shore, that we might have more room, fixed four swivel guns on the forepart of the quarter-deck, and took every other measure that appeared to be necessary for our defence.
The resident, Mr Swellingrabel, was at this time absent twenty miles up the country upon the Company's business, but had told me, that he should certainly return on the 1st of April, a day which I now expected with great impatience, especially as an old drunken serjeant was the most respectable person at the fort. In the evening of the 31st, a packet of letters for him arrived here from Macassar, which I considered as a good omen, and a pledge of his return at the time appointed; but I conceived very different sentiments when I learnt that they were sent to him. I did not suspect that he was privy to any such design as had been intimated to me by the letter; but I could not help doubting, whether he was not kept in the country that he might be out of the way when it should be executed. In this state of anxiety and suspense, I sent a message to the fort, desiring that an express might be dispatched to him, to acquaint him that I wished to see him immediately upon business of great importance, which would admit of no delay. Whether my message was forwarded to him or not, I cannot tell; but having waited till the 4th of April, without having seen him or received any answer, I wrote him a letter, requesting to speak with him, in the most pressing terms, and the next day he came on board. A few minutes convinced me that he was wholly a stranger to any such design as I had been made to apprehend; and he was clearly of opinion that no such design had been formed. He said, indeed, that one Tomilaly, a counsellor or minister of the king of Bony, had lately paid him a visit, and had not well accounted for his being in this part of the country; and, at my request, he very readily undertook to make farther enquiries concerning him and his people. The resident and his attendants took notice that the ship was put into a state of defence, and that every thing was ready for immediate action; and he told us, that the people on shore had acquainted him, before he came on board, with our vigilance and activity, and in particular, with our having exercised the ship's company at small arms every day. I informed him, that we should, at all events, continue upon our guard, which he seemed to approve, and we parted with mutual protestations of friendship and good faith. After a few days, he sent me word that having made a very strict enquiry, whether any other persons belonging to the king of Bony had been at Bonthain, he had been credibly informed that one of the princes of that kingdom had been there in disguise; but that of the eight hundred men who were said in my intelligence to be with him, he could find no traces; so that, except they too, like the troops of the king of Brentford, were an army in disguise, I knew that no such people could be in that country.
On the 16th, in the morning, the resident sent me word, that M. Le Cerf was returned from Macassar with another officer, and that they would come on board and dine with me. When dinner was over, I asked Le Cerf, among other conversation, while we were taking our wine, what was become of his expedition to Bally; to which he answered dryly, that it was laid aside, without saying any thing more upon the subject. On the 23d, he returned to Macassar by sea, and the other officer, who was also an ensign, remained to take the command of the soldiers that were still left at this place.
The season now approached in which navigation to the westward would be again practicable, which gave us all great pleasure; especially as putrid diseases had begun to make their appearance among us, and a putrid fever had carried off one of our people.
On the 7th of May, the resident gave me a long letter from the governor of Macassar, which was written in Dutch, and of which he gave me the best interpretation he was able; The general purport of it was, that he had heard a letter had been sent to me, charging him, in conjunction with the king of Bony, with a design to cut us off: That the letter was altogether false, exculpating himself with the roost solemn protestations, and requiring the letter to be delivered up, that the writer might be brought to such punishment as he deserved. It is scarcely necessary to say, that I did not deliver up the letter, because the writer would certainly have been punished with equal severity whether it was true or false; but I returned the governor a polite answer, in which I justified the measures I had taken, without imputing any evil design to him or his allies; and indeed there is the greatest reason to believe, that there was not sufficient ground for the charge contained in the letter, though it is not equally probable that the writer believed it to be false.
At day-break on Sunday the 22d of May, we sailed from this place, of which, and of the town of Macassar, and the adjacent country, I shall say but little, there being many accounts of the island of Celebes and its inhabitants already extant. The town is built upon a kind of point or neck of land, and is watered by a river or two, which either run through, or very near it. It seems to be large, and there is water for a ship to come within half cannon-shot of the walls: The country about it is level, and has a most beautiful appearance; it abounds with plantations, and groves of cocoa-nut trees, with a great number of houses interspersed, by which it appears to abound with people. At a distance inland, the country rises into hills of a great height, and becomes rude and mountainous. The town lies in latitude 5° 10' or 5° 12' S. and longitude, by account, 117° 28' E. of London.