NETHERLANDS, THE. 



589 



amounted to 1,083,190 guilders ; the expenses 

 to 1,416,734 guilders. 



The length of the railroads in operation on 

 the 1st of January was 1,976 kilometres, or 

 1,230 miles, of which 1,010 kilometres, or 630 

 miles, belonged to the state. 



The export and import trade of Holland 

 with the principal foreign countries, and with 

 the Dutch colonies, was in 1879 and 1880, in 

 millions of guilders and tenths of millions, as 

 follows : 



The number of sailing-vessels entering Dutch 

 ports in 1881 was 3,5,39, of 2,662,324 tons, of 

 which 3,326, of 2,609,601 tons, were laden, 

 and 1,246, of 869,001 tons, were of Dutch 

 nationality ; the number of steamers was 4,863, 

 of 7,417,575 tons, of which 4,776, of 7,292,- 

 876 tons, were with cargoes, and 1,089, of 

 2,054,918 tons, were Dutch. The merchant 

 marine in 1881 consisted of 802 sailing-ships, 

 of 658,887 cubic metres displacement, and 78 

 steamships, displacing 204,396 cubic metres. 



COLONIES. The colonial possessions of the 

 Netherlands have a total area of 666,700 square 

 miles, and contain more than six times the 

 population of the mother-country. 



Java and Madura, the most important of the 

 Dutch East India colonies, with an area of 51,- 

 324 square miles, have, according to the census 

 of 1879, a population of 19,298,804 persons. 

 The rest of the Dutch East Indies, comprising 

 Sumatra, Riau, Banca,Billiton, Borneo, Celebes, 

 the Moluccas, New Guinea, Timor, Bali, etc., 

 have collectively an area of about 665,000 square 

 miles, and a population estimated at 8,400,000. 

 The European and foreign population of the 

 Dutch East Indies is as follows: European ci- 

 vilians, 39,318; Chinese, 308,886 ; Arabs, 16,- 

 012 ; Hindoos and others, 33,221. Nearly three 

 fourths live in Java and Madura. The capital 

 of Java, Batavia, contains 102,901 inhabitants. 



The other important cities are Samarang, with 

 69,141, and Soerabaya, with 120,254 inhabi- 

 tants. 



The American colonies of the Netherlands 

 are two in number : Surinam, or Dutch Guiana, 

 45,890 square miles in area, containing in 1880 

 69,476 inhabitants, inclusive of about 17,000 

 Indians and bush negroes descended from ma- 

 roons, or runaway slaves ; and the colony of 

 Curagoa, or the Dutch West Indies, 434 square 

 miles in extent, and containing 42,530 inhab- 

 itants. 



The item of colonial administration in the 

 Netherlands budget applies to the West India 

 colonies only. The expenditures of Surinam 

 for 1882 are given in the estimates as 1,330,300 

 guilders, the receipts as 1,164,944; the expen- 

 ditures of Curacoa as 565,498, the receipts 528,- 

 631 guilders. The great East India colonies 

 have their separate budget voted by the States- 

 General. The estimates state the receipts for 

 1882 as 138,913,703 guilders, the expenditures 

 as 148,499,631 guilders. The receipts in 1881 

 amounted to 142,602,554 guilders, the expen- 

 ditures to 144,671,160 guilders. In normal 

 years a large surplus revenue is produced for 

 the benefit of the home government, averaging 

 between 1869 and 1876 nearly 20,000,000 guil- 

 ders. The sources of revenue are given in the 

 budget for 1882 as follow : 



Of the disbursements 24,859,110 guilders 

 were expended in Holland, and 123,640,521 

 guilders in the colonies. About one third of 

 the annual expenditure is for the army, and 

 one third for the general administration in 

 Java and the Netherlands. 



The " culture system," or species of serfdom 

 on which the Government of Java is based, has 

 been abolished in respect to the production ot 

 indigo, pepper, tea, tobacco, and other articles, 

 and is now confined to the cultivation of coffee 

 and sugar. Forced labor in the production of 

 the sugar-cane is to be done away with like- 

 wise in 1890. The bulk of the population are 

 agricultural laborers. Nearly the whole of the 

 soil is claimed as Government property. Pri- 

 vate ownership is confined to the northwestern 

 residencies, where a number of Netherlander 

 possess estates. The right to exact forced la- 

 bor from the natives on Government or private 

 property is limited to one day out of seven, for 

 which the laborers receive no wages. The vast 

 and complicated official organization has a sin- 

 gle head, the Governor-General, who has the 



