A meagre-looking apology for a soldier, leaning against a tree, suggested to us that we must be near the Resident’s dwelling:  we were so.  It soon appeared that it was the last of the large houses before mentioned, and that the soldier was the sentinel.

VISIT THE RESIDENT.

We were speedily ushered into the presence of D.T.  Vanden Dungen Gronovius.  What sort of person, reader, do you picture to yourself with such a name?  Great of course; and in truth such was he, not only in height and bulk, but as he soon informed us, in deeds likewise; he talked fast, and smoked faster, and possessed a general knowledge of all the recent discoveries.  We learned from him that the Zelee and Astrolabe were laid on their beam ends for twenty-four hours in the hurricane of last November, when the Pelorus was lost at Port Essington.  After listening to some strange and amusing stories about Borneo, where the Resident had been Superintendent for twelve years, we took our leave.  I was glad to find that Mr. Gronovius entertained views more liberal than Dutchmen generally do.  He had, as he told me, written to the Governor-General at Batavia, requesting that Coepang might be made a free port, and emigration allowed.  He most kindly offered us horses and guides for riding or shooting.

FORT CONCORDIA.

The observations for latitude, longitude, etc. were made in Fort Concordia,* near the flagstaff.  I was surprised to find this fort so much out of repair; the only guns fit to be fired out of were two brass six-pounders, the carriages indeed of which were not trustworthy.  On these guns I noticed the same mark as on that we found at Houtman’s Abrolhos, namely, two sides of a triangle bisecting two small circles.  I never see an old fort without thinking of the anecdote of a party from the Beagle visiting one at Valdivia on the west coast of South America.  The guns were very much out of repair, and when the remark was made to the old Spaniard who showed the fort, that they would not bear to be fired out of ONCE, with a shrug of his shoulders he replied that he thought they would bear it TWICE!  But to return to Fort Concordia:  it stands on a madreporic rocky eminence, about 60 feet in elevation, commanding the straggling town of Coepang, which, certainly, from the anchorage** does not impress the stranger with a favourable opinion of the industry of its inhabitants, though it improves in proportion as you retreat from the beach.  The foot of the height on which the fort stands is washed by a small rapid stream that skirts the south side of the town.  Its course from the eastward is marked by a deep gorge, on the sides of which a stranger might feast his eyes on the riches of tropical scenery.  Here and there above the mass of humbler vegetation, a lofty tapering coconut tree would rear its graceful form, bowing gently in the passing breeze.  On every hill was presented the contrast of redundant natural verdure, clothing its sides and summit, and of cultivated fields along the lower slopes.  These by irrigation are turned into paddy plantations, the winds blowing over which give rise to those insidious fevers, intermittent, I am told, in their character, which are so prevalent at Coepang, as well as dysentery, from which indeed the crew of the Beagle afterwards suffered.