1288
SINGAPORE
Singapore is considered to have a big future yet before it. Sir Frank Swettenham, in a speech delivered just before his retirement from the Governorship, indicated the future of Singapore in these words :-"You have in Singapore a city of 200,000 inhabitants, which will one day be a million, and a port reckoned by the tonnage of its shipping as the seventh largest in the world. That is something to begin with. Then you have a maginficent natural harbour on which nothing has yet been spent, but which, if it were protected by works, would afford 1,300 acres of sheltered anchorage. You have wharves and docks which have already fame beyond these shores and are capable of vast improvement. You have the making of a great naval base which we believe is already almost impregnable. Behind you, you have one of the richest countries, well watered and wooded, with no earthquakes or volcanoes, floods or famines or serious epidemics. Something has already been done to develop some portion of this country. Railways have been made, some mines have been opened, and planting has been done, and in the course of less than 30 years the revenue has grown from $5,500,000 to over $20,000,000 and the trade has grown from little or nothing at all to 100 millions of dollars. Then in the Colony you will have next year a revenue half as large again as this year, and united with that of the Federated Malay States it will be far larger than that of any other Crown Colony." To this it has to be added that the Colonial Government has decided upon an improvement of the harbour at a cost of £1,264,000, and a scheme exists for the improvement of the river at a cost of £523,187, but this scheme has been shelved for the present.
The climate of Singapore is remarkable for its salubrity, and the island has been described by medical writers as the "paradise of children," infantile diseases seldom being at all malignant. Despite its proximity to the equator, under normal circumstances a daily rainfall tempers the heat so thoroughly that many sleep beneath blankets. Droughts, however, have been experienced of from one to six months. The climate of the island is thus described by Mr. Thomson, in the "Journal of the Indian Archipelago,"his remarks still holding good:-"Singapore, though within 80 miles of the equator, has an abundance of moisture, either deposited by the dews or gentle refreshing showers, which keep its atmosphere cool, prevent the parching effects of the sun, and promote continual verdure. It seldom experiences furious gales. If more than ordinary heat has accumulated moisture and electricity a squall generally sets in, followed by a heavy shower of rain, such squalls seldom exceeding one or two hours in duration. According as the monsoon blows, you will have the squalls coming from that direction. But the most severe and numerous are from the west, called 'Sumatras,' and these occur most frequently between 1 and 5 o'clock in the morning. The north-east monsoon blows from November to March; after which the wind veers round to the south-east and gradually sets in the south-west, at which point it continues to September. The north-east blows more steadily than the south-west monsoon. The temperature is by one or two degrees cooler in the first than in the last. The average fall of rain is found, from the observation of a series of years, to be 92.697 inches; and the average number of clays in the year in which rain falls is found to be 180, thus dividing the year almost equally between wet and dry; the rain not being continuous, but pretty equally distributed through the year, January, however, being the month in which the greatest quantity falls. The mean temperature of Singapore is 81°.247, the lowest being 79 .55 and the highest 82°.31, so that the range is not more than 2°.76. It would appear from this that the temperature of the island is by 9°.90 lower than that of many other localities in the same latitude. Comparing the temperature now stated with that which was ascertained twenty years earlier, and in the infancy of the Settlement, it would appear that it had increased by 2.48-a fact ascribed, no doubt, to the increase of buildings, and to the country having been cleared of forest for three miles inland from the town, the site of the observations. The general character of the climate as to temperature is that the heat is great and continuous, but never excessive, and that there is little distinction of seasons, summer and winter differing from each other only by one or two degrees of the thermometer. Thunder-showers are of frequent occurrence, but the thunder is by no means so severe as I have experienced it in Java, and seldom destructive to life
or property.
"The botany of this place possesses several interesting considerations. Being a connection-link between the Indian and Australian forms, we have types of both, and many genera of either region. We observe the Indian forms in the natural families Palma, Sictamineæ, Aroidea, Artocarpeæ, Euphorbiaceae, Apocyneæ, Guttiferæ, Convol vulaceae, Leguminosa, all numerous. The natural families Casuairna, Myrtaceæ, parti cularly Melaleuca and Proteaceae, connect us with Australia.
The plants, which usually spring up when the primeval forest has been cut down, and where the lane of