and that the ship was waiting, for them? If so, they could not hope to slip on board unobserved. They were in for it. There would be a row! But when they were halfway off they saw unmistakable signs of approaching departure-lights moving about on board, the anchor light lowered, and the steaming light hoisted in its place. And as they got nearer they heard the reverberating tones of the boatswain's mate shouting, "Hands up anchor," coming across the perfectly smooth water. "Give way, you beauties," urged Sartoris, "or we shall miss the ship. We have no money with us to pay you. All our money's on board. They're getting up the anchor now. Give way." The boatmen responded nobly, and the boat flew across the oily muddy water, the stroke oarsman merely grunting out, "Dat's all right, massa, we's guineter cotch dat ship." Could they do it? Could these stout fellows get them alongside before the anchor was up and the engines started? The niggers were pulling for their fare. They were now close to the ship, and they could hear, in the stillness of the harbour, the fiddler playing, and could see with the mind's eye the little old man seated on the capstan scraping away at his fiddle, and the men running round at the capstan bars. Now they could hear the voices of the officers on And the captain replied, Serve them right, Bruce, serve them right. Teach them to think another time." The two midshipmen in question stole up alongside noiselessly without any one seeing them just as the order was given Avast heaving," and the report from the topgallant forecastle, "Anchor's up, sir. Clear anchor," was ringing along the deck as the two boys climbed thankfully up the chocks on the ship's side and ran straight into the arms of the gunner. But their luck was not out yet, for Sartoris and Mr Quoin, the gunner, were great cronies, so the former had no hesitation in applying to him for a loan of five shillings wherewith to pay the boatmen, one of whom had followed them up the side. This sum was at once forthcoming, and the boatman was sent down into his boat with strict injunctions from Mr Quoin to get away as quickly and as quietly as possible. Meanwhile the two boys fled down the main hatchway to their chests, where they rapidly got into uniform and returned on deck, the operation occupying something less than one minute. There Sartoris, whose station was on the quarterdeck, made himself particularly prominent in urging the men to greater exertions on the catfall. So much in evidence was he, indeed, that he could not fail to attract the attention of the first lieutenant, who, as soon as the anchor was secured and he was at liberty to turn his mind to other matters, sang out, "Mr Sartoris." "Sir," replied that zealous young officer, running up the poop ladder and saluting. "How did you get on board?" "In a shore boat, sir. We missed the officers' boat, and came off later in a shore boat," was that always truthful lad's answer. dinner?' "No, sir. Having missed the officers' boat, we knew we should be late for dinner on board, so scratched up something ashore and came along directly after we had finished.” "It is curious that no one saw you come on board. In fact, there's something curious about the whole business. But anyhow, you only had leave till sunset, and you acknowledge that you didn't get off by that time, so you needn't put your name in the book in a hurry. Your leave is stopped, both of you. I intended to let you stop behind here, just to teach you a lesson." "We've had our lesson, sir," was the enigmatical reply. JACATRA. BY DAVID HANNAY. THERE are three leading dates in the early history of the European powers in the Far East. They are: the seizures of Goa and Malacca by the Portuguese in 1510; the occupation of Swalley Hole by Sir Henry Middleton for the old East India Company exactly one century later; and the foundation of the city of Batavia, on the ruins of the Javan town, Jacatra, in 1619. In that year "Portuguese India" was in its death agony. A century and a quarter or so were to pass before Middleton's act was to produce its fruit; but the planting of the Dutch headquarters was to be followed well-nigh within a year and a day by the soaring rise of the domination which was to cover the Eastern sea all through the seventeenth century. brought with with him him soldiers, preachers, officials, and a council of eight members. Taken together, he and they appeared to give the Dutch in the East a strong central government, and, indeed, they did provide more in that way than was possessed by the servants of the English company. Yet they were far from being enough. If there was to be a Governor-General to rule all men, it was men, it was clear that his subjects must know where to find him. A council was quite unable to discharge its function if its members were to be scattered on missions which took them hundreds of miles away from one another. Now the three first Dutch governors had no house ashore. They lived in their flagship, and cruised from Bantam to the Moluccas and back; so there The Dutch had been active was never any absolute cerin the Indian Archipelago and tainty where or when Pieter the Moluccas since their first Both, or Gerard Reinst, or Voyage had been made by Laurens Reael was to be met. Houtman for the "Company Their council was rarely all tofor trade afar" of Amsterdam gether at hand. It soon began in 1595-97. They had planted to be obvious to the governing factories in native ports, of Chamber of Seventeen at home, which the most important was and to all men of sense in the at Bantam, in Java. Their East, that this cruising governfirst Governor-General, Pieter ment, here to-day and gone Both of Amersfoort, had to-morrow, was a makeshift. reached that anchorage in A fixed headquarters must be December 1610 after a painful found. Agreement on the abVoyage of ten months. He stract point was easy, but the VOL. CCXVIII.-NO. MCCCXIX. Q 2 choice of a place presented natives of the Banda Islands, difficulties. One authority when he instigated the hys would have preferred Ceylon. Another recommended a Spice Island. There were some who would have chosen Singapore. If the attempt made to capture Malacca had succeeded, that town would have answered the purpose; but the venture failed. Therefore no decision was reached. One man said one thing, and another said another, till the pressure of events and the resolute will of a certain leader combined to settle the question, and it turned out that the capital of Netherlands India was to rise where Jacatra had been, a little to the east of Bantam. The master whose word and deed achieved what others had only talked about was the Governor-General, Jan Pieterszoon Coen-the great man of Dutch history in the East. And if to be able to take survey of a vast field of action and to see it whole, if to know precisely what you aim at, if to try for a well-chosen attainable goal, if to know to a nicety what measures will enable you to achieve your purpose, and if to be prepared to do whatever is needful to the utmost-if these virtues and capacities amount to greatness, then great he was. Lovable he assuredly was not. Mr de Jonghe, in his Rise of the Netherland Rule in Java,' has to confess that Coen put splashes of blood on the history of his countrymen in the East. He did when he butchered the terical Van Speult to massacre the English factors in Amboyna, and when with fire and sword he swept Jacatra off the face of the earth to clear the ground for the foundation of Batavia. The Dutch historian can only plead that politics are not work for saints, and that when they are those of a monopolist trading company, they are particularly unsanctified. Mr de Jonghe says sooth; and having noted this much for once and for all, we can apply ourselves to seeing what Coen actually did. When he attained the position which gave him the chance to play a great game-that is, when Gerard Reinst put him at the head of the factory at Bantam-he was still a young man of twenty-seven. The place was a sink of iniquity. Coen, who had done the Company good service in the Moluccas, grappled with the prevailing evils which Reinst had vehemently denounced as being not only scandalous but horrible and abominable. He must have felt himself in his proper place, for, body and soul, heart and mind, he was the servant of the Company." His merits as a reformer of inward corruptions are not our theme, but what he did by way of outward and visible conquest. There is no need to say more of his career than that before he became formally Governor-General in March 1619, he had as President of Bantam and Jaca tra, and Comptroller of the other factories, been the true directing force in the Netherland Indies. The road he had to tread was full of pitfalls. In the first place, he had in front of him the rival English factory. The two could join to check the native ruler, but the fight going on in the Spice Islands naturally reacted on Bantam. There were collisions between the two nations, actual drawings of the sword, maim and manslaughter. But this rivalry was less trying than the relations of the Dutch with the natives. The whole island of Java was in one perpetual turmoil, one unceasing writhe and heave, of chieftains known by names exotic to us. On one hand, were claims to superiorities and tributes, to be enforced if possible. On the other, constant desire to evade these obligations if the vassal prince only could. All were prepared to call in any outsider who would serve an immediate turn. All were utterly false. To their minds a treaty was a means of gaining an advantage for the time being, and a device for carrying out a fraud. A promise was intended to bamboozle, and as to keeping it, that depended on one's strength. The part of the whole confusion which most affected Coen was the twist and twirl between Bantam, who was a great prince, and Jacatra, who was a small vassal Raja. In 1610 Jacques l'Hermite, then Dutch President at Bantam, had made a treaty for friendship and trade with Jacatra. Pieter Both had tried to extend this into a treaty right to build a strong factory. The Raja was not so foolish as not to know with what rapidity a meek European house for factors and a "godown" for goods had been found to turn itself into a stone fort armed with guns and garrisoned by soldiers. It would not even have been necessary for the Dutch to employ their own countrymen. The Tokugawa Shoquns had not yet stopped emigration from Japan. The Indian Archipelago and Gulf of Siam were swarming with Japanese Dugald Dalgettys ready to fight on any side of any question for their pay and allowances. So leave to build was at first refused. Nevertheless, and within a very short time, a fort was built-not because the Dutch compelled the Raja to consent but as a consequence of rivalries with Bantam. The first use to which the Dutch put Jacatra was to make play with it for the purpose of evading the exactions of the Bantamese ruler. When, seeing that the foreign traders were prosperous, he drew the deduction - so obvious to an Asiatic princethat if he only squeezed them hard enough they would pay higher dues, he demanded more. Coen was not unwilling to pay heavier import dues on one condition. It was that the true ruler of Bantam, who was not the Sultan, who was very |