products of the forest for trade, are agila-wood, ebony, and bees’-wax. The larger wild
mammalia are two species of wild boar, the same as those of Java, numerous, and
bunted by the Chinese, chiefly for their la rd ; a stag, cervus elephas; a roe, cervus
manjac; and the pigmy deer, moschus pigmeus; with the Malayan bear. The
elephant, the rhinoceros, and the tapir do not exist, and the largest rapacious
quadruped is a kind of pole-cat. The birds are, for the most part, the same as those
of Sumatra. The pigeon family is remarkable for numbers and variety, 30 species
having been reckoned. Among reptiles the alligators are numerous and dangerous,
being found on the coasts, and in the rivers and marshes. Esculent fish and
molluscs are abundant and of good quality.
The aboriginal inhabitants of Banca are a rude but inoffensive people, of the same
race and speaking the same language as the Malays, who call them Orang-gunung,
literally mountaineers, but in their acceptation 8 savages,” or wild men. These
people live in separate families, and do not, like the more civilised tribes, congregate in
villages. They cultivate a few patches of rice in a very rude way, and understand
the smelting of iron. In race, language, and state of society, they are essentially the
same as the wild inhabitants of the peninsula called the B&nuwa. On the coasts of
the island are found, seemingly, the same people, but with different habits, the Orang-
lant, or Sea-gipsies, sometimes called Sika. These dwell in their boats, having no
other habitation, and live by fishing, and occasionally by a little piracy. The mass
of the inhabitants of Banca, however, are colonists of comparatively recent times,
Malays, Javanese, and Chinese. In 1810, the total population of the island was
reckoned at 35,000, of which 18,000 were Chinese, which gives less than the poor ratio
of 10 inhabitants to the square mile.
The soil of Banca must be considered as decidedly sterile. I t consists of a layer
of mould, from afoot and a half to two feet deep, generally lying over the iron-stone
or laterite, already described. The only rural industry of the island consists in a few
patches of rice culture, and in raising a few fruits and culinary vegetables. The only
other industrious pursuit that deserves naming, consists in digging, washing, and smelting
the alluvial tin ore. This is entirely in the hands of the Chinese, who receive advances
from the Dutch government, which exercises a monopoly of the produce. In 1844,
the quantity produced was 70,289 piculs, or about 4300 tons, a quantity equal to
the produce of our Cornish mines, and, being all grain tin, superior to it in value. But
even this large product has since been greatly increased, for the quantity produced
in 1853 was no less than 5540 tons.
Banca has no trade worth naming, the only considerable export being tin, the
produce of a public monopoly, and the only imports iron and other necessaries of
life for its scanty population. The only place of trade is the only town in the
island, Muntok, situated on the shore of the safest roadstead, which is on the strait,
in south lat. 2°, and east long. 105° 15', containing no more than 3000 inhabitants.
The only considerable revenue arises from the profits of the tin monopoly, a precarious
one, which even the government that exercises it can hardly calculate or
reckon upon. The government pays to the miner, on an average, about eight
Spanish dollars for each picul of the metal, this weight being equal to 125 Dutch, or
about 134 English pounds. Now the ordinary Indian market-price of tin, for the weight
in question is about 20 dollars, so that there seems a gross profit of 12 dollars. This
is however, subject to many deductions, as European superintendence at the mines
and furnaces, transport of the metal to Java, where it is sold, public establishments
there for storing and selling, and risk of competition with the free produce of the
Malay peninsula and its islands, not to mention all the civil, military, and naval
expenses of the island, kept up chiefly, if not wholly, on account of its tin. Leasing
the mines to adventurers for a certain rent, as practised by the proprietors of mines
of all descriptions in Britain, and as is practised by the British government with its
tin mines at Malacca, would be a far more effectual means of securing a certain
revenue, than a monopoly which substitutes the dolings of public revenue for the
wholesome efficacy of capital. The freedom of such a system could hardly fail to
increase the amount of the produce. If it be taken only at 75,000 piculs, or short
of 5000 more than the produce of the monopoly in 1844, and a seignorage of 15 per
cent, were levied on it, and realised by farming it, the net revenue would amount,
at the value of 20 dollars a picul, to 225,000 dollars, equal to £48,730. This view
is corroborated by the results of the system as pursued at Malacca. The tin mines
of this place were only effectually worked for the first time in 1845, and in 1848
they yielded 7000 piculs of tin. Their inferior fertility to those of Banca, and
even the inferiority of the metal produced, did not admit of a higher seignorage
B than 10 per cent., but even at this rate, they yielded a revenue of near 10,000
W B N W B t e of Banca, all that is worth narrating may be briefly told. An island B which was not known to contain tin, until the first years of the last century, which
^ILvas unfertile in soil, without natural facilities of irrigation, and which had no coveted
natural products is not likely to have tempted the resort of strangers, and seems to
have been left almost entirely to its rude inhabitants. The Javanese, who, according
to their own chronicles, established themselves at Palembang, in Sumatra, about the
kear of our time 1378, appear to have formed some establishments on the western
side of Banca, which may still be traced by their names derived either from the
Javanese or Sanscrit language, as Kuta-waringin, “ the fort of the Indian fig-tree; ”
Ms&ngka-kuta, the fort of Banca; and Selan, the mythological Indian name of Ceylon.
»T w o centuries, from the first appearance of Europeans in the Archipelago, had passed
»away, before Banca had attracted any other notice from them than as an appendage
B o f Sumatra. A pure accident called attention to it. Some of the inhabitants in
’ V burning the forest, in their rude culture of rice, found that some superficial tin ore
B'eorl been smelted in the process, and ore being sought for in the neighbourhood, it
i§|was found in abundance. This happened in the year 1709, and in 1711 the dis-
igjovery was known at Batavia to the Dutch. The fact of the manner in which, and
the time when the discovery was made, are well ascertained. It is a signal proof of
the ignorance and incuriousness of the Malayan nations, that the Javanese, the most advanced
of them, should have been, after 330 years, as sovereigns of Palembang, masters
of Banca, without being aware that it had rich mines of an useful metal well known to
them. That the European nations should have been in the same state of ignorance
ip to be accounted for, by their being wholly employed during that long time in no
worthier pursuit than the attempt to establish commercial monopolies in such paltry
Commodities as cloves, nutmegs, and black-pepper. The tin of Banca was no sooner
i tjpiscovered than the Sultan of Palembang established a monopoly of it, and no sooner
HBras it known to the Dutch that he had done so, than they forced an engagement
S o n him, securing to themselves the right of pre-emption at a very mean price. This
lllstate of things continued for a whole century, and until the conquest of the Dutch pos-
■sessions by the English in 1811, when the Sultan of Palembang, in the base hope of
¡¡1 gratifying the conquerors, put the whole of the Dutch at Palembang and Banca to
death. The return for this office was an invasion of Palembang, the defeat of the
¡BsSultan, his dethronement, and the acquisition of Banca, as a cession from his successor
J»in 1812. The island continued a British possession until 1816, when, along with the
■rest: of their possessions, it was restored to the Dutch. These in 1818 restored the old
■ Sultan, whose treachery brought on a war of two years, which ended in 1821 by the
■conquest of Palembang, which, with Banca, have since continued in undisputed
■ possession of the Netherland government.
BANCALIS. One of four low islands, of considerable size, separated from each
Bother, and from the north-eastern coast of Sumatra, by narrow straits. These islands
¡jjlie off the mouths of the rivers of Siak and Kampar, between the first and second
■degrees of north latitude. Bancalis, which belongs to the Malay state of Siak, is about
B 3 5 miles in length by 10 in breadth, mostly covered with forest and thinly inhabited.
BANDA. The Banda or Nutmeg Islands consist of a group of mere islets, said to
■ b e five in number, like the Clove Islands, but really amounting to ten, although some
■ o f them be uninhabited. Their names were probably given by the Malayan traders,
^■who had frequented them for ages : Banda, correctly Bandan, means in Javanese the
■ th in g or things tied or united, or with the word Pulo, “ united islands.” Pulo Nera
■ i s the “ island of palm-wine.” Lontar, written by Europeans Lonthor, is the name of
■ th e palm, the leaf of which is used for writing on, the word being half Sanscrit and
■ h a lf Javanese. Pulo Ai, properly Pulo Wai, means “ water-island; ” Pulo Pisang,
^■banana island; ” Pulo Run (Rung), “ chamber island ; ” Pulo Suwanggi, “ sorcery
^■sland Gunung-api, “ fire mountain or volcano." A name which, with the Dutch
' pronunciation and orthography, cannot be traced to a Malayan language, is Rosingen.
■W* is written by De Barros, however, Rosolanguim, and if this, as is likely, be nearer
j ^rU6 wor<^> N may possibly be derived from the Javanese word roso, “ strength,”
and langg&ng, “ firm, assured.” And Pulo Kapal may either signify “ ship island” or
MS horse island,” for the annexed word means the first in Telinga, borrowed by the
■ K fK l i a? , o ^ , secon(^ Javanese. The whole group lies between Bouth latitudes
50 40, and the Dutch fortress of Belgica, on the island of Nera, is in east
■longitude 129 54 20".” Lontar, called usually by Europeans the Great Banda, is the