After the capture of the Isle of France, the British government resolved to complete its dominion in the East, by the conquest of the island of _Java_, of which the Dutch had held undisturbed possession for more than one hundred years. The extent of the island,--six hundred and forty miles long, and about a hundred broad; the luxuriant and fertile character of the soil, the mountain districts yielding the vegetables and grain of Europe, and the plains the delicious fruits and other valuable productions of the East in abundance, without the necessity of laborious tillage, and to so great an extent as to occasion it to be sometimes called the granary of the East; rendered the island of Java a valuable acquisition to the United Provinces, and its principal city, Batavia, was the capital of the Dutch settlements in the East Indies. Holland having become a part of that empire which Napoleon was forming to prepare the way for universal dominion, it became necessary to deprive the Dutch of the large and fertile island of Java, and a body of troops was placed under the orders of Lieutenant-General Sir Samuel Auchmuty for that purpose. In this enterprise the first battalion of the FOURTEENTH Regiment was employed, and the greater part of the officers and men were re-embarked in March on board of the men-of-war ordered to cruise off the island, in which service they had various opportunities of distinguishing themselves, in destroying gun-boats, and in other enterprises on the coast. On one occasion Lieutenant Gillman, who commanded a party on board the boats of His Majesty's ship "Sir Francis Drake," was killed. The conduct of a detachment under Lieutenant J. H. Heyland, embarked in the sloop "Procris," engaged in the boarding of some of the enemy's gun-boats, was highly commended in the public despatch of Captain Maunsell, R.N. Detachments consisting of the FOURTEENTH and Eighty-ninth Regiments, Royal Marines, and seamen, were landed from His Majesty's ship "Minden," near Bantam, on the coast of Java, and, in two contests, defeated five hundred of the enemy's chosen troops, which had been sent to Batavia to attack them. Captain Watson, Lieutenants Rochfort, McLean, and L'Estrange, and Ensign Jennings, of the FOURTEENTH, and Lieutenant Dunscombe of the Eighty-ninth, particularly distinguished themselves on these occasions. The head-quarters sailed from Madras on the 18th of April, 1811, and landed on the 4th of August, at the village of Chillingching, about twelve miles east of _Batavia_, towards which city the army directed its march. The French and Dutch troops set fire to the magazines in Batavia, and abandoned the city, which was taken possession of by the British.