a partial attempt to regain his authority over all the neighbouring country, they petitioned the European authority to prevent, by its interference, his levying a duty upon his own subjects. The petition was attended to; and the king was compelled, by the command of strangers, to forego the only means by which he could have preserved his dominions from anarchy and confusion. At the period, therefore, when the resources of his kingdom would have been unfolding themselves, by the improving industry of a well-regulated population, it is falling into decay, through the personal imbecility and political weakness of the monarch; and, breaking into detached fragments, is about to form as many separate principalities, as formerly there were independent governments throughout all the Archipelago[66]. That there has been, at some time, a more extensive commerce on the shores of the Archipelago is highly probable, and that there might be cannot be doubted. The great resources, vegetable and mineral, with which they abound, such as spices, camphor, gold, and diamonds, and the facilities which they enjoy for navigation, offer means and inducements of the highest nature. The general character of the people, also, as far as it can be ascertained, appears equally favourable to commercial intercourse. They are represented as mild, inoffensive, not indisposed to industry, free from any obstinate prejudices of superstition, and altogether of a different temper from that of the few who remain in a constant state of warfare on the coast. Another favourable circumstance is the existence of sovereigns, whose rights, however infringed, are in principle acknowledged, and who have never been known to favour, what must be considered the chief misfortune of these countries, and the source of almost all the rest, the horrible system of piracy. The evil is manifest, and the remedy is not of difficult discovery. Were legitimate and acknowledged sovereigns assisted in resuming their due authority, piracy and rebellion might be destroyed, these shores would be peopled with their native inhabitants, whose industry, awakened and invited by the opening of a safe navigation to the capitals, would in fleets of small vessels, so essential to the prosperity of the Eastern settlements, bring the produce of the interior down the innumerable rivers, and communicate to countries, beyond the reach of foreign adventurers the comforts of civilised life.