“Although Borneo is so large an island, and although some parts of the coast have been known for many years, very little information has been yet received respecting the interior of the country, and the different people who inhabit it. The Chairman of the Committee of Correspondence, conceiving that a knowledge of this island has become more than ever an object of importance to the British public, in consequence of the trade with China, and with the islands in the Eastern Sea, having been laid open to all British subjects, has taken measures for procuring translations into English of the different works upon the subject written in Dutch; and for collecting all the information relative to Borneo, which can be obtained from those persons who have visited the coasts of that island. Mr, Earl, who has acquired much knowledge relative to different parts of it, sent a paper to the Society, which was published in the third volume of this Journal; and we have now the pleasure to publish the following paper sent to Sir Alexander Johnston by the same gentleman, who, we hope, will soon have an opportunity of obtaining still further information upon the subject, by joining the expedition which is about to sail for the purpose of making a survey of the Eastern Seas; and which will afford him the means of completing those inquiries which he has already carried on, as appear by the papers we have published, with so much zeal and intelligence.”

Some of the coins of which Mr. Steuart possesses so extensive a collection, and of which he has favoured the Society with such full and valuable illustrations, have from time to time found their way to Calcutta, and been noticed and delineated by Mr. James Prinsep in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Knowing the active interest which that gentleman has displayed in the investigation of the different important numismatic discoveries recently made in India, and anticipating from his singular talent for deciphering novel forms of Indian characters, the possibility of his finding the key of those which occur on Mr. Steuart's coins, I requested Captain Harkness to transmit to Mr. Prinsep a copy of the engravings now published. The advantages expected from this communication have been more than realized, as the characters have been deciphered and the inscriptions satisfactorily read. The May number of the Bengal Journal just received, contains an interesting account of Mr. Prinsep's success, and repeats the legends of Mr. Steuart's plate arranged in the order in which each is to be read, differing chiefly in this respect from the plate, in transferring to the head of the line the two or three letters which there stand at the end of it.

It is well known that Damascus was formerly celebrated all over the world for its manufacture of sword-blades, and it is recorded, that when Timúr Lang conquered Syria, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, he carried off all the manufacturers of steel into Persia; since which period, the fabrication of arms has declined at Damascus, and the successors of those workmen, being dispersed over the East, are said either to have lost the secret, or ceased to make blades of more than ordinary goodness. We must, however, first divest ourselves of all prejudice in favour of the exaggerated reports of their qualities, and remember, that at the time when the natives of the East were well acquainted with the art of working in iron and steel, we, and indeed all Europe, appear to have been comparatively in a state of perfect ignorance; the ancient swords of Damascus, therefore, when opposed to those of other countries, were probably found to be infinitely superior in temper and quality; which, combined with their great external beauty, stamped them for ages with so high a character for excellence, that they are even now handed down as heir-looms by Eastern princes to their posterity. The extraordinary prices that have been offered and obtained for them, sufficiently attest the estimation in which they were held, which is certainly not warranted in the present day, when swords of equal, or superior quality, might be manufactured at one-twentieth of the expense. In addition to the foregoing observations, the strength and great dexterity of the swordsmen must be taken into consideration, and much of the apparent superiority of these blades may be undoubtedly ascribed to this cause.

There are very few popular beliefs of any duration, however extravagant or incredible, that cannot be traced to some foundation in truth, however much distorted by ignorance, superstition or folly; and we have a remarkable instance of this in the celebrated Upas, or Poison Tree of Java, whose shade was believed to extinguish life in the unhappy beings who sought refuge under it. It was stated to be in a valley in the interior of Java, but it was surrounded with so many terrors, that its exact locality was not likely to be well defined or understood; and in this uncertainty originated the fables which have so long been before the public. I am indebted to Sir Charles Forbes, for a copy of a letter addressed to the late W. Taylor Money, Esq., Consul-General at Venice, from a gentleman who visited the Guwo-Upas, or Poisoned Valley, near Batur, in Java, on the 4th of July, 1830. I understand that the letter has appeared in print, but I have not seen it; and I deem it necessary to incorporate it in the present paper, to facilitate the comparisons and deductions I purpose making. A perusal of it will, I presume, afford satisfactory reasons to conclude, that in this deadly spot originated the belief in the Poison Tree, the mistake of the mephitic vapour escaping from vegetation, rather than from the soil, being natural and probable. The writer of the letter is a gentleman of the name of Loudon, an Englishman, but a landholder in Java, well known to Doctor Horsfield, and full reliance may be placed on the accuracy of his descriptions. He is disposed to question the resemblance between this Valley of Death and the Grotto del Cane, near to Naples; but I will endeavour to show that the difference is only in the physical features of the localities, and that the probability is, that the effects described originate in precisely similar causes. Dr. Horsfield informs me that he was at Batur in 1815 and 1816, and aware of the vicinity of the poisonous valley, but the natives refused to conduct him to it.

The Paper on the T'hags was drawn up in 1832, from the personal observations of Lieutenant Reynolds, who had been for a considerable time (nearly two years I believe) employed by the Resident at Hyderabad, as a sort of Agent among that extraordinary people. His principal and public object was to gain information as to the extent and scenes of their depredations, by admitting and taking down the testimony of such among them as were willing to become approvers; so that ultimate steps might be taken to put down the systematic practice of such horrid atrocity. In this he succeeded so well, that whilst I was at Hyderabad in 1833, a body of, I think, nearly three hundred of them were brought in as prisoners, were tried by the Resident, under a special commission for that purpose, and were punished by hard labour on the roads, to which, I believe, the awarded sentence of death was commuted.

In the Asiatic Society Journal for September 1835, Mr. Prinsep, the distinguished Editor of that invaluable publication, has given the result of the examination of two bottles of sea-water; one from the Indian Ocean, the other from the Red Sea. The officers of the Hugh Lindsay steamer having reported that, in consequence of the greater saltness of the Red Sea than of the Ocean, it was necessary “to blow-off much more frequently while in that part of the voyage,” Lieut. Burnes had, therefore, brought to India a bottle of the water of the Ocean, and of the Red Sea, which were found to have (at the temperature of 86°), a specific gravity of 1·0254 and 1·0258 respectively; too small a difference to cause any sensible effect in blowing-off. But as lime might exist in greater quantity in the inland sea, the analysis was principally directed to ascertain the proportions of sulphuric acid and lime, the precipitation of which is the cause of the necessity of blowing-off.