ves are in general inoffensive, and have given
little disturbance to our establishments; but parties of Achinese traders
(without the concurrence or knowledge, as there is reason to believe, of
their own government), jealous of our commercial influence, long strove
to drive us from the bay by force of arms, and we were under the
necessity of carrying on a petty warfare for many years in order to
secure our tranquillity. In the year 1760 Tappanuli was taken by a
squadron of French ships under the command of the Comte d'Estaing; and in
October 1809, being nearly defenceless, it was again taken by the Creole
French frigate, Captain Ripaud, joined afterwards by the Venus and La
Manche; under the orders of Commodore Hamelin. By the terms of the
surrender private property was to be secured, but in a few days, after
the most friendly assurances had been given to the acting resident, with
whom the French officers were living, this engagement was violated under
the ill-founded pretence that some gold had been secreted, and everything
belonging to the English gentlemen and ladies, as well as to the native
settlers, was plundered or destroyed by fire, with circumstances of
atrocity and brutality that would have disgraced savages. The
garden-house of the chief (Mr. Prince, who happened to be then absent
from Tappanuli) at Batu-buru on the main was likewise burned, together
with his horses, and his cattle were shot at and maimed. Even the books
of accounts, containing the statement of outstanding debts due to the
trading-concern of the place were, in spite of every entreaty,
maliciously destroyed or carried off, by which an irreparable loss, from
which the enemy could not derive a benefit, is sustained by the
unfortunate sufferers. It cannot be supposed that the government of a
great and proud empire can give its sanction to this disgraceful mode of
carrying on war.

In the Philosophical Transactions for the year 1778 is a brief account of
the Batta country and the manners of its inhabitants, extracted from the
private letters of Mr. Charles Miller, the Company's botanist, whose
observations I have had repeated occasion to quote. I shall now
communicate to the reader the substance of a report made by him of a
journey performed in company with Mr. Giles Holloway, then resident of
Tappanuli, through the interior of the country of which we are now
speaking, with a view to explore its productions, particularly the
cassia, which at that