With respect to the possible longevity of Europeans in Java, Dr. Selberg's account materially differs from Mr. Davidson's estimate. The Dutch _employes_ have to serve sixteen years in the colony to be entitled to a furlough and free passage home, and twenty years for a pension. Very few, according to the doctor, live long enough to enjoy the one or the other. And those who do, buy the privilege at a dear rate. Their emaciated bodies, enfeebled minds, thin hair, and dim eyes, show them to be blighted in their prime. True it is that, with few exceptions, they utterly neglect the primary conditions of health in a hot country. They enervate themselves by sensual indulgences, and consume spirits and spices by wholesale. There is an absurd belief amongst them, that drink keeps off disease and preserves life, a case of _aut bibendum aut moriendum_; whereas the truth is precisely the contrary, for in that climate spirits are poison. The fact probably is, that they drink to dispel ennui, and to banish, at least for a while, the regret they feel at having exchanged Europe for Java. Dr. Selberg, states, that every European he spoke to in the colony, longed to leave it. But the voyage home is costly, and so they linger on until death or their furlough relieves them. Some lucky ones succeed in making rapid fortunes, but these are the very few, whose example, however, suffices to seduce others of their countrymen from their Dutch comforts, to brave fevers, tigers, mosquitoes, and the other great and little perils of Java, in pursuit of wealth which they rarely acquire, and which, when obtained, their impaired health renders it difficult for them to enjoy. Another class of the colonists consists of men who, having committed crimes in their own country, have fled from the vengeance of the law. These are thought little the worse of in Java, where the transition from one quarter of the globe to the other seems admitted as a species of moral whitewashing. And indeed, bad characters so abound amongst the scanty European population, that if the respectable portion kept themselves aloof, they would probably be found the minority. Many of the reprobates have realised considerable property. The rich host of the principal hotel at Surabaya, is a branded galley-slave. Dr. Selberg often found himself in the society of hard drinkers, and these, when wine had loosened their tongues, would let out details of their past lives, which at first greatly shocked his simplicity. "I was once," he says, "invited to a dinner, which ended, as usual, with a drinking bout. My neighbour at the table, was a German from the Rhine provinces, who had been twelve years in Java. He got very drunk, and spoke of his beloved country, which he should never see again. He was a man of property, well looked upon in the island, and I asked him what had first induced him to settle there. He replied very quietly, that it was on account of a theft he had committed. I started from my chair as if an