to delineate the principal features of the Sarampei, Sungei Tenang and
Korinchi countries, inland of Ipu, Moco-moco, and Indrapura; and
advantage has been taken of all other information that could be procured.
For the general materials from which the map is constructed I am chiefly
indebted to the kindness of my friend, the late Mr. Alexander Dalrymple,
whose indefatigable labours during a long life have contributed more than
those of any other person to the improvement of Indian Hydrography. It
may be proper to observe that the map of Sumatra to be found in the fifth
volume of Valentyn's great work is so extremely incorrect, even in regard
to those parts immediately subject to the Dutch government, as to be
quite useless.

UNKNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS. TAPROBANE.

Notwithstanding the obvious situation of this island in the direct track
from the ports of India to the Spice Islands and to China, it seems to
have been unknown to the Greek and Roman geographers, whose information
or conjectures carried them no farther than Selan-dib or Ceylon, which
has claims to be considered as their Taprobane; although during the
middle ages that celebrated name was almost uniformly applied to Sumatra.
The single circumstance indeed of the latter being intersected by the
equator (as Taprobane was said to be) is sufficient to justify the doubts
of those who were disinclined to apply it to the former; and whether in
fact the obscure and contradictory descriptions given by Strabo,
Pomponius Mela, Pliny, and Ptolemy, belonged to any actual place, however
imperfectly known; or whether, observing that a number of rare and
valuable commodities were brought from an island or islands in the
supposed extremity of the East, they might have been led to give place in
their charts to one of vast extent, which should stand as the
representative of the whole, is a question not to be hastily decided.