rhinoceros' hides and horns; with clephants' teeth, and those of a variety of marine animals, ebony, benzoin, Malayan camphor, sandal-wood, lignum-aloes, and agar-agar, a species of marine moss, cheaply used by the Chinese in room of gum, in several of their manufactures, and which might perhaps be substituted by ourselves with advantage, for the expensive gums at present employed in the arts.

We give this hasty list, chiefly to point out to our readers the indiscriminate avidity with which the commodities of the Indian islands are demanded in the markets of China. For the ordinary products of the Indian islands, the Chinese have a taste in common with the rest of mankind; but to these they add a list peculiar to themselves; and with them there is a stea dy demand for some articles rejected by, or even revolted at, by the taste of other nations.

Two prominent articles of the list deserve, from their value in the general commerce of mankind, a more particular notice, viz. gold and tin. The first metal abounds in almost all the islands of the Archipelago; but it is in the great islands of Sumatra and Borneo that the most fertile sources have been discovered. Gold, until the last few years, was obtained in the Malay islands by processes not much more skilful than those practised by the negroes of Africa, or the aboriginal inhabitants of America: But, recently, the skill and industry of the Chinese has been applied to the speculation of mining in Borneo; and the result has been, a prodigious augmentation of produce. In the countries lying between the rivers of Sambas and Pontianak, six thousand labourers of that nation now produce annually to the value of a million and a half of Spanish dollars of this precious metal, by the simple process of passing a stream of water over the sand which contains the ore, and which is extracted from mines of no great depth,-kept free from the intrusion of water, by the application of some simple Chinese machinery. The only authentic grounds we have to form a conjecture respecting the amount of the whole gold of the Archipelago, are the custom-house books of Calcutta, which show, that, in five years, the value annually imported into that city alone, from the Malayan ports, averaged 266,000 Spanish dollars.

Tin is an article of still more value; for the western portions of the Indian Archipelago are the only countries in the world where it is produced for useful purposes, save a corner of Great Britain. The little island of Banka, acquired by the valour of British soldiers, and cast away by the folly and ignorance of her politicians, is the principal repository of this metal, and yields annually, under a most vicious system of management, and at a price wonderfully low, at least 4,725,000 of pounds; being

more than two-thirds of the produce of the mines of Cornwall, justly deemed so grand a source of our national wealth.

The trade which Europe has carried on with Japan was conducted, on the part of the former, chiefly with the commodities of the Indian islands; a fact which may teach us a new lesson respecting the commercial value of the latter. The currency of those commodities, indeed, approximates them rather to the nature of the precious metals, than to the more vulgar objects of commercial exchange. The cloves, mace, and nutmegs-the pepper, camphor, and sugar of the Archipelago, are still eagerly demanded by the Japanese. With these, we know, from the most authentic and recent sources, that there is also an anxious demand for the manufactures of Europe; and a preference, as elsewhere, for those of England. But what avails all this?--for it is impracticable to introduce them; and it will always be so, until some European nation becomes possessed, as the Dutch once were, of the island of Formosa; for we consider it to be quite certain that it was to the greatness of the power they possessed in that island, at the doors of the Japanese monarchy, they owed their admission to the trade of the empire, and not to the meanness of their submissions, however abject. From the moment the Japanese ceased to be overawed by the neighbourhood of the Dutch, they ceased to respect them. The trade decayed from year to year; and at last dwindled into a pittance, hardly worth the adventure of a private merchant.

The trade between the Indian Islands and the Hindu-Chinese nations, is too inconsiderable, on its present footing, to deserve a minute description. The carriers in this trade are the Chinese, whose peaceable habits, and whose views, palpably and unequivocally mercantile, give them a claim to confidence in the ports of Cochin-China, Tonquin, Camboja, and Siam, which is justly refused to the ambitious and distrusted monopoly companies of Europe. It is in these countries, particularly in Siam, that their great junks or vessels, even those in which they trade between the Archipelago and China, are constructed, of the fine and abundant teak wood of that country. The Indian islands afford to these countries their fine spiceries, gold, and tin; and require, in return, the cheap and excellent salt and rice of the latter. Many articles which they yield in common, such as sugar, pepper, and teak timber, might be conveniently stored at the emporia of the Archipelago for exportation. Even in touching upon this ground, facts crowd upon us far beyond our limits.

The trade between the Indian Islands and Bengal is of recent origin, and has had its source in the enterprising spirit of a few

British merchants, though fettered by the thousand vexatious restraints of the monopoly. The exports to Bengal are pepper, tin, gold, coffee, Japan copper, teak wood, and many minor articles;-the imports, chiefly opium and piece goods. By the custom-house books of Calcutta it appears, that at least a million and a half of rupees' worth of opium is exported to the Indian islands; which averages a gross profit to the merchant of 30 per cent., and generally not less than 250 per cent. to the governments which draw an excise revenue from it; the result of which to that of Java, for example, ought not, under good management, to be less than one million of Spanish dollars annually. The average of four years proves, that three millions seven hundred and seventy-six pounds of pepper are yearly imported into Calcutta from the various ports of the Malayan Archipelago.

The only article of this branch of trade which deserves especial notice, is teak timber, which, in our times, has been principally exported to Calcutta, where it has sold for full 300 per cent. above its prime cost, and that cost an arbitrary price affixed by the European government. This invaluable timber is hardly produced anywhere in the Indian islands but in Java; and, even in Java, is confined to the most fertile districts of that fine island. Yet its abundance makes ample amends for the narrow limits of its production; for the inexhaustible forests of Java now contain the ready materials of many British navics. The extraordinary qualities of this timber, and its superiority even over British oak, are now so universally admitted, that it would be superfluous to insist further on the subject; but we may mention as a fact, worth the knowledge of the politician, that, saving the teak, the splendid and luxuriant forests of the Indian islands (and the same observation may be extended to all those of central Asia) afford no timber, fitted by strength and durability, for the general purposes of shipbuilding. Of this fine wood, in spite of our precarious occupation, at least 8000 tons of square-rigged vessels were constructed in our times in Java; and probably not less than 10,000 tons of the unwrought timber were exported to Calcutta. The exportation of this timber to Britain, had the island continued a British possession, might have constituted a material branch of trade, and contributed to such a degree to the naval strength and resources of the empire, as it is in vain to look for from any other Asiatic connexion; for no one at all ac quainted with the facts, can calculate on such a result from the half-exhausted forests of Malabar, and the precarious and inferior produce of those of Pegu.

With the countries of the Decan, or Southern Peninsula of Hindustan, and the Indian islands, a commercial intercourse of great antiquity has subsisted, through which it appears that the islanders received the religion, literature, and arts of India-a singular discovery, recently but unequivocally determined. Of the inhabitants of both coasts of the Peninsula, but particularly of those of Coromandel, whole shoals annually pour over on the western portions of the Archipelago, among whom are to be found Hindus as well as Mahomedans. These emigrants are notorious, in the Indian islands, for their intelligence, expertness, and chicanery: The cargoes brought by them, in vessels awkwardly constructed, though navigated after the European model, consist chiefly of white and blue cottoncloths, chintzes, salt, and tobacco; and the returns are betel-nut, gold, tin, damar, bees-wax, ivory, lignum-aloes, frankincense, cloves, nutmegs, and black pepper.

The Arabs, as soon as they became possessed of the ports on the Persian gulf, entered upon the field of Indian commerce; but the precise period of their first appearance in the seas of the Archipelago is not known. In the beginning of the 13th century, the intercourse increased; some of the natives were converted to the Mahomedan religion—and, in the course of the next two centuries, nearly all the civilized tribes. This intercourse still continues. The navigators of Arabia, from the Persian and Arabian Gulfs, bring bullion, dried fruits, salt, and Indian cottons, which they dispose of for the usual produce of the Indian islands, and particularly for the sugar of Java, the most considerable article of the return cargoes. Besides the marketable cargoes, the Arabian shipping accommodate a host of simple pilgrims, who contribute, with the small zeal and learning imported from Arabia, to keep alive the embers of Islam in the Archipelago.

Of all Oriental traders, the Arabs, in intelligence, spirit and enterprise, approach the nearest to the bold and adventurous geDius of European nations. The Indian islands, in spite of the intolerant genius of the Arabian religion, owe much to this connexion. In many situations, the priests or apostles of Arabia established independent authority, and rose to sovereign rank. Wherever this happened, as at Bantam, Achin, Palembang, Pontianak, and perhaps Malacca, commerce flourished; and ceased not to do so until crushed by the ambition, injustice, or false policy of Europe.

The commerce of the Indian islands with Europe, being the most important to us, will require a longer detail than those branches already enumerated. We may premise, that our intercourse with these fertile islands bears, on the whole, a much

stronger resemblance to that which we originally maintained with America, than to our connexion with the great nations" of continental Asia; for the latter are inhabited by civilized,. populous, and, in some sense, manufacturing communities; and the islands by tribes far less improved, and often thinly scattered over a great though fertile territory. Add to this the rich peculiarity of the productions of the Indian islands, and their suitableness to the general taste and habits of the European nations; and we think our readers will agree with us in holding, that, of all branches of the Indian commerce, this promises to be ultimately of the greatest value. The prominent articles of export to Europe are well known to be, the fruit of the clove and nutmeg trees, black pepper, coffee, and sugar. The minor articles are, diamonds, gold, rattans and canes, benjamin, tortoise-shell, elephants' teeth, with buffalo horns and hides.

A singular and anomalous fact in regard to the consumption of the finer spiceries in Europe in modern times, has been remarked; and, by those interested in the support of existing abuses, has been generally ascribed to the caprices of fashion. It is, at all events, notorious, that within the last two centuries, the consumption of these costly articles has prodigiously diminished; while the population, wealth and luxury of the consumers have increased in an equal degree. This seeming caprice, however, we conceive may be very easily accounted for. The fine spices have been sold at an exorbitant monopoly price, beyond the means of the consumers, who have been compelled to content themselves with the less costly; leaving the narrow market of the former to a few opulent customers. These spices themselves have accordingly been withdrawn from consumption, exactly as they rose in price; and mace, the most extravagant, in by far the greatest degree. They have been supplied by black pepper, pimento, ginger, and capsicums, cheap commodities, which have followed the natural progress of a free trade-fal len in price, and augmented in consumption. It is the injustice of a monopoly in the higher spiceries which has injured their sale; for Nature produces them in abundance, in a luxuriance indeed which is amply proved by the pains which the monopolists use to suppress their production, amounting to the very extirpation of the plants-for they grow spontaneously in the forests of a thousand islands. The trade in spices, which is known to be ruinous to the monopolists themselves, and never occupies more than the tonnage of a single East Indiaman, might, with free culture, and unrestricted trade, become a great branch of the commerce of the Indies-promoting industry, extending the comfort and enjoyment of the consumer, and rescu