[Page 553]
449.
Some account of Batavia
[Margin note] Hills
On these hills, some of the principal people have countrey houses, which they visit once a year, the General especialy has one, said to be built upon the Plan of Blenheim house near Oxford, but never finishd. Physicians also, often send people here for the recovery of health, lost in the low countrey, & say, that the effects of such a change of air is almost miraculous, working an instant change in favour of the patient, who during his stay there remains well, but no sooner returns to his necessary occupations at Batavia, than his complaints return in just the same degree, as they were in before his departure.
[Margin note] Necessaries & Luxuries
Few parts of the world I beleive are better furnish'd with necessaries, as well as Luxuries of life,
[Margin note] Java
than the Island of Java, the unhealthyness of the countrey about Batavia, is in this particular rather an advantage to it, for the very cause of it, a low flat situation, is likewise the cause of a fruitfullness of Soil hardly to be paraleld, which is suficiently