THE JAVA SYSTEM. 



A new edition was recently advertised of Mr. Money's book 

 " Java; or, How to Manage a Colony (1861)," and the work deserves 

 to be read by all who are concerned with, eastern administration. 

 It was written with a hearty appreciation of the many excellent- 

 points in the Netherlands Indian Government, some of the best 

 of which — the village-police system, for example — originated in 

 the brief rule of the English and Sir S. Raffles. Mr. Monet 

 drew a wholesome moral, and one which has since been recognised 

 to some extent by the Indian Government, out of " the wide-spread 

 u misery and discontent arising from our plan of making the 

 " debtor's land liable to be sold to pay the creditor's claim," com- 

 '• pared with the Java method, under which " the Native nobles 

 " have never been subjected to such losses by the operation of 

 " laws unsuited to their state of soeiety :" and again in contrasting 

 our annexations in Oude, &c. with the Dutch adherence to old treaty 

 engagements in Java. He points out that they became the protec- 

 " tors and the real rulers of the Preanger about the same period of 

 " last century that we adopted those functions towards the Nawabs 

 " ofBengal and the Carnatic. The Preanger has ever since been as 

 " much in the Dutch power as Bengal and the Carnatic are in ours. 

 " But to this day the country is governed by the descendants of 

 '• the Native princes with whom the Dutch treaties were made 



" In pecuniary difficulties, almost in bankruptcy, the 



" Java Government sternly withstood the temptation of relieving 

 " their wants by annexing the Preanger and by taxing its inhab- 

 " itants." 



The greater part of the work deals with the" culture system" of 

 Governor-General Van den Bosch (1832), and much of Raffles' 

 prior reorganisation was necessarily modified by its introduction. 

 As to these changes, the financial results have been most successful ; 



