I returned only recently from an eight-month round the-world trip which took me to large parts of Africa, some islands in the Indian Ocean, Australia and New Zealand, all of Southeast Asia, and the Far East. One can observe these parts of the world with an inexhausted curiosity, the more so if one has seen them several times in the past. While at first it is amply noticeable that many of these lands are still below the threshold of economic development, a second Or third visit also reveals hitherto unsuspected signs of social stability—acting, to be sure, as a brake on rapid progress, but also helping to maintain a kind of steadiness in people's attitudes and worldviews.