There is a still graver question for the moralist to consider—the effect of these same physical influences upon human character. No observer of men in different parts of the world can fail to see that different races have been modified by climate, not only in color and features, but in temperament, in disposition, and in character. A hot climate makes hot blood. Burning passions do but reflect the torrid sun. What the Spaniard is in Europe, the Malay is in Asia. There is a deep philosophy in the question of Byron:
"Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle
Are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime,
Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the turtle,
Now melt into sorrow, now madden to crime?"
But I must not wander into deep philosophy. I only say that great as is the charm of life in the tropics, it is not without alloy. In landing in Java it seemed as if we had touched the shores of some enchanted island, as if we had found the Garden of Paradise lying far off in these Southern seas. We had come to the land of perpetual spring and perpetual summer, where nature is always in bloom, and frost and snow and hail have fled away to the bleak and wintry North. But as we are obliged to go back to that North, we wish to be reconciled to it. We find that one may have too much even of Paradise. There is a monotony in perpetual summer. The only change of seasons here is from the dry season to the rainy season; and the only difference between these, so far as we can see, is that in the dry season it rains, and in the rainy season it pours. We have been here in the dry season, and yet we have had frequent showers, with occasional thunderstorms. If we should stay here a year, we should weary of this unrelieved monotony of sun and rain. We should long for some more marked change of seasons, for the autumn leaves and the winter winds, and the gradual coming on of spring, and all those insensible gradations of nature which make the glory of the full round year.
And what a loss should we find in the absence of twilight. Java, being almost under the Equator, the days and nights are almost equal throughout the year; there are no short days and no long days. Day and night come on suddenly—not instantly, but in a few minutes the night breaks into the full glare of day, and the day as quickly darkens into night. How we should miss the long summer twilight, which in our Northern latitudes lingers so softly and tenderly over the quiet earth.
Remembering these things, we are reconciled to our lot in living in the temperate zone, and turn away even from the soft and easy life of the tropics, to find a keener delight in our rugged clime, and to welcome even the snow-drifts and the short winter days, since they bring the long winter evenings, and the roaring winter fires!
We leave Java, therefore, not so much with regret that we can no longer sit under the palm groves, and indulge in the soft and easy life of the tropics, as that we part from friends. Our last night in Batavia they took us to a representation given by amateurs at the English Club, where it was very pleasant to see so many English faces in this distant part of the world, and to hear our own mother tongue. The next morning they rode down with us to the quay, and came off to the steamer, and did not leave us till it was ready to move; and it was with a real sadness that we saw them over the ship's side, and watched their fluttering signals as they sailed back to the shore. These partings are the sore pain of travel. But the friendships remain, and are delightful in memory. A pleasure past is a pleasure still. Even now it gives us a warm feeling at the heart to think of those kind friends on the other side of the globe.