a labyrinth of deserted
streets and crumbling houses, abandoned on account of their
unhealthiness. The contrast is striking on emerging from this scene of
solitude and desolation into the bustling Chinese Kampong, where that
active and ingenious people carry on their innumerable trades and
handicrafts. Here mechanics, with the simplest and seemingly most
inadequate tools, give a perfect finish to their manufactures; here are
shops full of toys, clothes, food, of every thing in short that can
minister to the wants and tastes of Chinese, Javans, or Europeans. "On
the roofs of several Chinese houses, I saw jars, some with the mouth,
others with the bottom turned towards the street. They are so placed in
conformity with a singular custom. The jar whose bottom is turned to the
street indicates that there is in the house a daughter not yet grown up.
When the damsel becomes marriageable, the position of the jar is
reversed; and when she marries, it is taken down altogether."

Both numerically and by reason of their energy and industry the Chinese
form a very important part of the population of Java, and but for the
precautions of the Dutch government they would soon entirely overrun the
island. The number allowed to settle there annually, is limited by law,
and during Dr. Selberg's stay at Surubaya, he saw a large junk,
containing four hundred of them, compelled to put back without landing a
passenger. Thus their numbers are kept stationary, or may even be said
to decrease; for in 1817, Raffles estimated the Chinese in Java at
nearly a hundred thousand, whilst Dr. Selberg, twenty years later,
calculates them at eighty-five thousand. Although in China emigration is
forbidden by law, from the over-populated districts, and when the
harvest fails, thousands of Chinese make their escape, and repair to
various of the East Indian islands. The majority of those in Java have
been born there of Javan women married to Chinese men, who compel their
wives to adopt their national usages. The children of these unions are
called _pernakans_ by the Dutch, and in their turn are married to
Chinese. The result has been a race which cannot be distinguished from
the pure Chinese. New comers from the mainland generally arrive with
little besides the clothes upon their backs, and obtain employment and
support from their more prosperous countrymen until they know the
customs and language sufficiently to make their way unassisted. Proud
and conceited