Page:A voyage round the world, in His Britannic Majesty's sloop, Resolution, commanded by Capt. James Cook, during the years 1772, 3, 4, and 5 (IA b30413849 0001).pdf/90

60

Quanto præstantius esset

viridi si margine clauderet undas

Herba, nec ingenuum violarent marmora tophum! Author:Decimus Junius Juvenalis.

The houses are built of brick, and many of them are white washed on the outside. The rooms are in general lofty and spacious, and very airy, which the hot climate requires. There is but one church in the whole town, and that is extremely plain, and seems to be rather too small for the congregation. That spirit of toleration, which has been so beneficial to the Dutch government at home, is not to be met with in their colonies. It is but very lately that they have suffered even the Lutherans, to build churches at Batavia, and at this place; and at the present time, a clergyman of that persuasion is not tolerated at the Cape, but the inhabitants are obliged to content themselves with the chaplains of Danish and Swedish East-India-men, who give them a sermon, and adminster the sacrament once or twice a year, and are very handsomely rewarded. The government, and the inhabitants do not give themselves the trouble to attend to a circumstance of so little consequence in their eyes, as the religion of their slaves, who in general seem to have none at all. A few of them follow the Mahommedan rite, and weekly meet in a private house belonging to a free Mahomedan, in order to read, or rather chaunt several prayers,