Sketches, Civil and Military, of the Island of Java and Its Immediate Dependencies, Comprising Interesting Details of Batavia, and Authentic Particulars of the Celebrated Poison-Tree (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1811 Excerpt: ...the manufacture of cotton cloths, as an article of trade for the Company, and to supersede part of. their large importations of the article front Hindostan; but hitherto with very little success. Java also produces salt, though it is not aa article of very extensive commercial importance. Most of it is brought from Rembang, where the Company purchase it at the rate of six rixdollars per five thousand pounds, and they export it to the west coast of Sumatra, where it is disposed of, generally, at the rate of between thirty and thirty-five rixdollars for three thousand pounds weight, which is equal to about -oj. od. sterling per ton English, and the selling price from 91;. %d. to 107s. per ton. The north-eastern coast, and part of the district of Cheribon, furnish a very large quantity of timber, logs, beams, boards, knees, &c. which is not only sufficient for the consumption of Batavia, for ship-building, houses, and domestic uses, but a very considerable quantity of it is annually exported to several of the out-factories, and, in particular, to the Cape of Good Hope. The large forests in the above districts, belong to the Company; the natives are obliged to fell and prepare the timber, as a kind of feudal service, so that no other emolument is made by them, on this score, than the hire of the draftOxen by which it is conveyed to the sea-shore; and this, together with the freight by sea, forms the whole of the purchase-money and charges of the timber. Those forests, however; begin to be considerably diminished. Next is reckoned indigo, which although not an original production of Java, has been cultivated with tolerable success, since the Company have been established here; insomuch that, whereas formerly that article was obliged to be sent for from ...