There is no limit to the length of a property. I thought the equal sign between database and kdemo would be clipped by the Property parser but i tested an example on Win2k with JDK 1.5.0 and it behaved properly (interpreted a second equals sign on a line as part of the property value):
<test.properties>
property2=01234=56789
property3=fdsa\=asdf
<program output>
name = property2 value = 01234=56789
name = property3 value = fdsa=asdf
Try replacing the equals sign "=" with the escaped version "\=" and see if it makes a difference on your platform.