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COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
system 55 may be, it has at least been productive of con- 
siderable benefit to the Javanese. 
The revenue and expenditure of Java occupies about 
two-thirds of the Netherlands India Budget, and upon the 
abundance or deficiency of its crops the variations in that 
document largely depend. Apart from customs and 
other dues the revenue is chiefly derived from coffee, the 
opium and salt monopolies, and the rent of land. The 
Budget for the eight years inclusive, from 1884 to 1891, 
shows extraordinary irregularity. Thus in 1887 the 
revenue exceeded the expenditure by £2,091,652, while 
in 1891 there was a deficiency of £1,702,194. The 
mean surplus for these eight years was about £75,000. 
No surplus, however, can safely be counted upon, and 
there is no doubt that the prosperity of Java, which was 
formerly so great as to admit of a large and certain 
annual contribution being made towards the revenue 
of the mother-country, has been for many years 
diminishing. 
11. Population. Towns. 
In January, 1890, the census gave the united popula¬ 
tion of Java and Madura as 22,819,074, of which 
233,717 were Chinese, and 13,365 “Arabs.” The 
Europeans numbered 42,364. Central and some parts 
of Eastern Java and the island of Madura show the 
densest population, the Sunda lands being only sparsely 
inhabited. The mean density of the population of the 
nine provinces of Central Java is 657 to the square mile, 
while that of Belgium, the most thickly populated of 
European countries, is only 530. In the province of 
Bagelen the density reaches the astonishing figure of 964 
to the square mile. It is said that in the year 1780 
