The History of Java, v. 1-2

by Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles

The Arabs, it is known, had in the ninth century, if not long previously, made themselves acquainted with these countries; and the Chinese, if we may trust the Javan annals, had visited Java at the same period. According to Kempfer, the Maláyus in former times had by far the greatest trade in the Indies, and frequented, with their vessels, not only all the coasts of Asia, but even ventured to the shores of Africa, and particularly to the great island of Madagascar; "for," adds this author, "John de Barros in his Decades, and Flaccourt in his History of Madagascar, assures us, that the language spoken by the inhabitants of that large African island is full of Javan and Malayan words: subsisting proofs of the commerce with these two nations, about two thousand years ago the richest and most powerful of Asia, had carried on with Madagascar, where they had settled in great numbers."

Whatever credit we may attach to these statements and inferences, respecting the commerce of these islands before they were visited by Europeans in the fifteenth century, it is certain that, at this period, an extensive trade was established at Malacca, Acheen, and Bantam, then the great emporiums of the Eastern Archipelago. Hither the rich produce of Sumatra, Borneo, and the Moluccas, was conveyed in the small trading craft of the country, and exchanged for the produce of India and China. These ports were then filled with vessels from every maritime state of Asia, from the Red Sea to Japan. The Portuguese, who preceded the Dutch in India, and who had fixed upon Goa, on the coast of Malabar, as the capital of their eastern settlements, selected Malacca as the most convenient station for conducting and protecting their trade with the islands, and erected it into a secondary capital. The Dutch finding this desirable station pre-occupied, and being foiled in their attempts to dislodge their rivals, first established a commercial settlement at Bantam, and subsequently subdued by force of arms the neighbouring province of Jákatra, (or Jokárta), on which, as will be afterwards mentioned, they built the fortress, the city, and the port of Batavia.

Nor was it without reason that they selected this spot for the capital of their new empire. "What the Cape of Good Hope is," says Adam Smith, "between Europe and every part of the East Indies, Batavia is between the principal countries in the East Indies. It lies upon the most frequented road from Hindustan to China and Japan, and is nearly about midway on that road. Almost all the ships, too, that sail between Europe and China, touch at Batavia; and it is, over and above all this, the centre and principal mart of what is called the country trade of the East Indies, not only of that part of it which is carried on by Europeans, but of that which is carried on by the native Indians, and vessels navigated by the inhabitants of China and Japan, of Tonquin, of Malacca, of Cochin China, and the Island of Celebes, are frequently to be seen in its port. Such advantageous situations have enabled these two colonies to surmount all the obstacles which the oppressive genius of an exclusive company may have occasionally opposed to their growth: they have enabled Batavia to surmount the additional disadvantage, of perhaps the most unwholesome climate in the world."

It would be as difficult to describe in detail the extent of the commerce enjoyed by Java[55], at the period of the establishment of the Dutch in the eastern seas, as it would be painful to point out how far, or to show in what manner, that commerce was interfered with, checked, changed in its character, and reduced in its importance, by the influence of a withering monopoly, the rapacity of avarice armed with power, and the short-sighted tyranny of a mercantile administration. To convey an idea of the maritime strength of the native princes anterior to this date, as giving a criterion by which to judge of the trade of their subjects, it may be sufficient to state that warlike expeditions, consisting of many hundred vessels, are often reported to have been fitted out against Borneo, Sumatra, and the peninsula. In the art of ship-building, however, they do not appear to have advanced beyond the construction of that sort of vessel adapted to the navigation of their own smooth seas, and now to be met with in all their ports and harbours; nor do they seem to have had any knowledge of maritime geography beyond the shores of their own Archipelago, and the information which they gained from the reports of the Arabs, or the traditions of their own more adventurous ancestors. This circumstance would lead us to infer that the trade of Java was carried on chiefly in foreign vessels, and through the enterprize of foreign adventurers. The habits of the people had become agricultural; they had nearly deserted an element which they had no powerful temptation to traverse, and on which they could reap little, compared with what they could draw from the fertility of their own territory. Leaving therefore their ports to be filled, and their commodities to be carried away by the Maláyus, the Búgis, the Indians, the Chinese, and the Arabs, they for the most part contented themselves with enjoying the advantages of a trade, in which they incurred no chance of loss; and thus, though their own country yielded neither gold nor jewels, they are said to have been plentifully supplied with these and other valuable articles on their own shores, in exchange for the produce of their tranquil industry and their fertile soil. This kind of traffic was almost entirely annihilated, or at least very much diverted from its ancient course, by the restrictive system of Dutch colonial policy. Some branches of it were, it must be allowed, partially encouraged by the influx of European capital and the demand for particular articles which bear a high price in the European market; but this was an inadequate compensation for the loss of that commerce, which may be said to be as much the growth of the country as any of its indigenous plants. In order to show to what insignificance it was reduced under Dutch oppression, and what tendency it has to improve under a better system, it is only necessary to compare its state during the latter years of the Dutch government, before the blockade, and afterwards during the short interval of British administration. For the first of these purposes, I have drawn, in the introduction to this work, a short sketch of the condition of the Dutch East India Company, for a considerable period previous to our arrival; and I now proceed to give some account of the external and internal trade of Java, as it existed at the time when we restored it to its former masters.

The extent of this commerce, since the establishment of the British government, and since a greater freedom of trade has been allowed, may, for a want of a better criterion, be estimated from the amount of tonnage employed since the beginning of the year 1812, at which period the operations of the military expedition had ceased, and the transports were discharged.

In the year 1812, the number of square-rigged vessels which entered the port of Batavia amounted to 239, and their aggregate tonnage to 48,290 tons, and in the same year the native craft amounted to 455 vessels, or 7,472 tons, or together 55,762 tons. The quantity cleared out during the same year was 44,613 tons of shipping, and 7,762 of native craft, making together 52,375.

In the year 1813, the number of square-rigged vessels was 288, and the tonnage 51,092, the native craft amounting to 796 vessels, or 13,214 tons, or together 64,306 tons.

In 1814, three hundred and twenty-one ships, or 63,564 tons, cleared out with 568 native vessels, or 9,154 tons, shewing the total tonnage of Batavia during this year to have amounted to 72,718 tons.

The returns for the following year have not been received, but they are estimated to exceed either of the two former years, and not to have fallen much short of one hundred thousand tons; and it may be noticed, that during one year after the first accounts were received of the successes of the allied armies against France, no less than thirty-two ships, measuring fifteen thousand tons, cleared out, and carried cargoes, the produce of Java, to the London market.

The average annual tonnage which cleared out from the port of Surabáya, for the three last years, amounted to about thirty thousand tons, and the native tonnage trading to the neighbouring port of Grésik is estimated to have even exceeded that quantity.