CHAP. XL.] IN THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO. 463 



a larger share of influence in our legislation, our commerce, 

 and our whole social organization — we shall never, as 

 regards the whole community, attain to any real or im- 

 portant superiority over the better class of savages. 



This is the lesson I have been taught by my obser- 

 vations of uncivilized man. I now bid my readers — 

 Farewell ! 



Is'OTE. 



Those who believe that our social condition approaches per- 

 fection, will think the above word harsh and exaggerated, but it 

 seems to me the only word that can be truly applied to us. We 

 are the richest country in the world, and yet one-twentieth of 

 our population are parish paupers, and one-thirtieth known 

 criminals. Add to these, the criminals who escape detection, 

 and the poor who live mainly on private charity, (which, accord- 

 ing to Dr. Hawkesley, expends seven millions sterling annually 

 in London alone,) and we may be sure that more than one-tenth 

 of our population are actually Paupers and Criminals. Both 

 these classes we keep idle or at unproductive labour, and eacli 

 criminal costs us annually in our prisons more than the wages of 

 an honest agricultural labourer. We allow over a hundred 

 thousand persons known to have no means of subsistence but 

 by crime, to remain at large and prey upon the community, and 

 many thousand children to grow up befon-e our eyes in ignorance 

 and vice, to supply trained criminals for the next generation. 

 This, in a country which boasts of its rapid increase in wealth, 

 of its enormous commerce and gigantic manufactures, of its 



