■October, and three hundred others dangeroufly ill to the hofpital.
A fa& no lefs deplorable than certain, is, that the fmall
expence and facility with which the ziel-verkoopers aftually
carry on their infamous trade of fupplying the India company
with recruits, makes them lefs attentive to the pre-
fervation of health among thefe poor people. Nothing is
more common, in this and other Dutch colonies, than to
meet with foldiers in the company’s fervice who, upon
enquiry, acknowledge they have been kidnapped in Holland.
There is an apothecary’s fhop belonging to the
hofpital, where the moft neceffary remedies are prepared,
but no expenfive drug is to be found in it, and the method
of adminiftering to all the patients indifcriminately
out of two or three huge bottles, full of different preparations,
fuffice to convince us, that the frefli air of the
land, and frefh provifions here, contribute much more to
the recovery of the fick, than the fkill of their phyficians.
Patients who are able to walk, are ordered to go up and
'down the Streets every fair morning.; and all kinds of
greens, pot-herbs, fallads, and antifcorbutics are raifed
for their ufe in an adjacent garden belonging to the company.
Travellers have fometimes praifed and fometimes
depreciated this garden, according to the different points
o f view in which it has been confidered. It is true, a
few regular walks of indifferent oaks, encompafled with
elm and myrtle hedges, are not objects engaging enough
to
to thofe who are ufed to admire the perfection of gardening
in England, or who contemplate in Holland and France
cyprefs, box, and yew trees cut out into vafes, Itatues, and
pyramids, or charmilles turned into pieces of architecture !
But confidering that the trees were planted in the begin-
ning of this century, more for ufe than ornament ; that
they fhelter the kitchen-herbs for the hofpital, againft the
deftrudtive violence of florins;, and that they form the only
fhady and airy walks, comfortable to voyagers and fick
perfons in this hot climate, I cannot wonder that fome
fhould extoll as “ a delightful fpot what others contemptuously
call “ a friar’s garden f . ”
The day after our arrival, the aftronomers of both
fhips, Mr. Wales and Mr. Baily, fixed their inftruments
alhore, within a few yards of the identical fpot where
Meffrs. Mafon and Dixon had formerly made their aftro-
nomicai obfervations. The fame day we began our botanical
excurfions in the country about the town. The
ground gradually rifes on all fides towards the three
mountains which lie round the bottom of the bay, keeping
low and level only near the fea-fide, and growing
fomewhat marfhy in the ifthmus between the Falfe and;
Table bays, where a. fait rivulet falls into the latter. The;
Saturday i;.
* <r r ” t ° re ^ 0wadmiraI) B™ ° » - SeeHawkefworth’ s compilation,.vol I,,
t. M. de Bougainville. See his. Voyage round.the. World.
mardi y