Forty Thousand Miles Over Land and Water

Tuesday, December 16th.—Tons of lava ashes have been floating by us all day, still the remains of the great eruption of Krakatau, eighteen months ago. Just before dinner we passed the Roma, another of the B.I.S.N. ships, and dipped flags with her. Her decks were black with the crowd of emigrants.

Thursday, December 18th.—Yesterday we passed the island of Rotti (Hindustani for bread) and the islands of Sandal-wood and Timor, a possession divided between the Dutch and Portuguese, and which supplies Java with a good breed of small but timid ponies. To-day we seem in sight of land again from the succession of islands—Sumbawa, Lombok, and Baly, all belonging to the Dutch. In the two latter we saw very high mountains, ranging in Lombok to 12,000 feet, and in Baly to 10,000. It is a continuation of the great volcanic range that runs through the entire islands of Sumatra and Java. Mr. Alfred Wallace, the great naturalist, divides the islands of this archipelago into two distinct divisions—those that from their characteristics and productions are identified with Australia, and those that may be classed as belonging to Asia. The line is distinctly drawn between the islands of Lombok and Baly, which are divided only by the narrow strait of fifteen miles. After dinner, and against the apple-green sunset, we saw the dark line of the coast of Java. Night after night we have been having these most glorious sunsets, gorgeous in their Eastern magnificence of colouring, and the phosphorescence of the water is far more brilliant than when we were in the tropics crossing the Pacific. Shoals of flying-fish have kept us company during the voyage, not counting sharks and porpoises.

At 10 p.m. we sent up a rocket, and waited at the entrance to the narrow Straits of Baly for the pilot to come off from Banjoewangi. We passed through the narrow passage at midnight, not seeing the tropical jungle, which here touches the water's edge, nor hearing the roar of the leopards and panthers who infest the shores.

Friday, December 19th.—We are in the Sea of Java. Numerous kattamarangs and canoes, with their outrigged frames that keep them steady in the water, tell us we are within reach of busy life again. Bamboo rods, with several lines attached for fishing, protrude out of the water, and speak of hungry humanity once more. In the afternoon we lose sight of Java, going on the outside of the island of Madura, as the water is not deep enough for us inside.

On the last evening of our voyage we went down to the engine-room. The two cylinders sliding up and down as fast as the eye can follow them are wonderful, but more interesting is the tunnel, running quite aft, containing the revolving cylinder of the screw. None but Orientals could stand the intense heat of the furnaces, the normal temperature being never less than 120°.

We went half-speed towards evening, so as not to arrive at Batavia before daylight to-morrow morning; and we shall be able to leave the ship immediately after breakfast.

There are voyages in which one is sorry when the journey is nearing an end, but this may not be counted as one of them.

The advantage of the Torres Straits route is that you may insure a calm sea usually as far as Aden, whereas in that by South Australia it is always as rough as in the Bay of Biscay in the Australian Bight; but the heat in the Torres Straits is intensely great, travelling as you are for days on a line with the Equator, and but few degrees removed from it.

CHAPTER XIII

NETHERLANDS INDIA

Our first voyage across the Atlantic began the fate which has since pursued us, of arriving at our destination on Sunday. We have landed at New York, at Auckland, at Wellington on Sunday, and now, after our three weeks' voyage through the Torres Straits, the Arafura Sea, and Indian Ocean, we find ourselves at anchor early on a Sunday morning inside the little breakwater of Tandjong Priok, the harbour of Batavia.

The scene which greets me as I go up on deck is truly Dutch. I see low stretches of flat, marshy land, barely redeemed from the ocean, with a group of red-tiled roofs, hidden among some tall, straight trees in the foreground, and the peculiar watery-grey sky so dear to the Dutch landscape painters.

Terrible confusion reigns on board as we leave. Hatches are battened down, ports closed, skylights carefully covered over, for a dozen lighters are alongside preparing for the dreaded operation of coaling. A little steam-tug is bringing them up as fast as it can, lashed together in single file, with ten more barges, with cargo and provisions to be taken on board, on the other side. The natives—Javanese and Malays—have paddled out in their canoes, bringing contributions of fruit and vegetables "on spec," and are climbing up the side of the ship or swarming on the decks.

All on board the Merkara envy us deeply as we say good-bye to them, for they have the present prospect of the horrors of coaling, and prospective ones in the five weeks' voyage, with the tossing in the Bay of Biscay that still remains to them before arrival in England. The tender takes us off and lands us opposite the station, a bamboo shed, by the side of the single line of rails. We find here a group of Fathers and Sisters, but just landed from the ship which came in and anchored after us this morning, from Holland.

The railway-carriages are painted a dismal grey, and two doors lead to the three seats running lengthways down the carriage, the additional one being placed in the centre. The carriages were so dirty that even a Javanese wiped the seat before sitting down. The new docks at Tandjong Priok have recently been made by blasting the land away with dynamite to the required size, when the sea was allowed to rush in. We travelled along by the side of the canal, which has been made for the carriage of merchandise from the docks to the town. Dense jungle—our first sight of real tropical jungle—skirted the towing-path, along which barges were being towed, while boats, with their one clumsy sail, passed up and down. We arrived at another bamboo shed—the station of Batavia.

Batavia is the capital of Java, and with its 1,000,000 of inhabitants, 80,000 of whom are Chinese, is second in importance and size only to Calcutta, and therefore may be called the second town in the East. It is also the chief city of Netherlands India, or the Dutch East Indies. Their possessions in this Eastern Archipelago are numerous, including as they do the west coast of Sumatra, part of the coast of New Guinea and of Borneo, the four islands of the Moluccas and Celebes, the islands of Madura, Sambawa, Lombok, and Baly, and part of Timor, the five latter of which we passed in the Torres Straits, and Banka and Riou, near the Straits Settlements.

Outside the station there was a crowd of little two-wheeled carriages, or victorias, drawn by the funniest little ponies, that could only be dignified by the name of "rats." They are about the size or smaller than our Shetland ponies, and are nearly all imported from Timor. They go like the wind when once they are fairly off, but they jib horribly at starting. You often see the ridiculous sight of two or three natives standing helpless before the persistent jibbing of one of these rats, when you know that they could lift them up with ease.

A drive through China Town by the side of a canal brought us to the "Hotel der Niederlanden." Here, under the circular portico, was a marble floor, with chairs and tables arranged in groups, where John the Chinaman never wearies of coming with his wares for sale, tied up in large pocket-handkerchiefs, day after day, showing you the same bright-coloured cotton pyjamas, and sarongs, or cambric handkerchiefs, with gold-embroidered slippers, soap, or carved ivories, scent or sandalwood boxes. It matters not that you frown and scowl, or push the things away, he still persists in thrusting them under your nose, and when he goes his place is immediately taken by another, not discouraged by his non-success and the identity of the wares. The prices asked are exorbitant in the first instance; one-fourth is, however, gladly accepted in the end. On a centre table stands gin-bitters (without charge), as a welcome to new arrivals. Upstairs we found musty corridors, dark and rambling, untidy and uncarpeted, with native servants squatting outside their master's doors, blacking boots, or playing at games amongst each other. The dining-room is a kind of loggia, built out, with the roof supported by pillars, leaving the sides entirely open to the courtyard, and these are protected by green and white blinds. Round this courtyard, under the low red-tiled roof and pavé, the Dutch ladies and gentlemen spend their day, lounging, writing, and reading, whilst their "boys," or Javanese women, are washing or busy around them.

We sat down to the "reis tag," or midday "rice meal," at a long, bare table. A deep soup-plate was put before one, into which you lay a layer of rice two inches thick; then in succession are handed to you eight or nine dishes containing little messes—strips of omelette, kromeskies, gherkin, hard-boiled eggs, chicken, dried fish, an orange sauce (which I never ventured on), lobster salad, fried potatoes, and pickles. A round tray with many divisions is also offered, with chili, chutney, cucumber, and cayenne pepper, caviare, and relishes of all sorts. You see a Dutch lady sitting with the rice before her, and choosing leisurely first from one dish and then from another, and when she has done so mixing and chopping it all up together. The custom of the "reis tag" prevails throughout the whole of the Netherlands India, and though it is not a purely Dutch custom, the curious mixture has its origin from Holland, and the rice and fruit which follows from the East.

Between the hours of 1 and 5 p.m. life at Batavia pauses. Sleep settles down on the community; no sound is heard in the house, and the streets are deserted. A general awakening for the enjoyment of the cool of the evening comes with the tea, brought at five o'clock. The heat in Java, situated 6° from the Equator, is always tropical, and never varies from one end of the year to the other, beyond that, in the rainy season, which lasts during December and January, it is more oppressive and unhealthy. Java in general, and Batavia especially, bears a very bad name for malaria. In Batavia it is greatly increased by the canals which the Dutch could not fail to introduce from the mother country. The canals are freely used by the natives for bathing and washing in, and even the horses are brought down here to be cleaned. The dark, brackish water was also formerly used for drinking purposes. Artesian wells have been lately sunk all over the city; since then there has been no epidemic of cholera, which constantly prevailed in Batavia to a terrible extent up to that time.

Mr. MacNeill, the English consul, was most kind in sending his carriage for us in the evening.

We drove along under the broad avenues of trees, overhanging the canals, and shading the pathway of red tiles. All is scrupulously clean, and the roads well kept and carefully watered. The houses have an extraordinary similarity; as brilliant as whitewash and paint can make them, they have all the same high pointed roofs, covered with red tiles, that seem out of proportion to the one storey of the house below, almost hidden under the shade of the projecting verandah. A gravel drive, with a grass-plot and one bed of brilliant and variegated crotons in the centre, forms the unvarying approach. A marble post at the gateless entrance bears the name of the owner, so that every visitor easily finds the house he seeks. The doors and windows stand always open, and you have such charming glimpses of the cool, dark interiors, and take away some little incident of domestic life within as you pass along. People go away for months, we are told, and leave doors unlocked and windows shutterless, for robbers in Batavia are unknown. In the marble verandahs stands the familiar round table, with the four rocking-chairs, in their dear old-fashioned white dimity "nightcaps," set primly round. In the evening they are brightly lighted, and tenanted with people receiving their friends.

We drove along the Königsplein, or park, bordered by the palace of the Governor-General and many of the prettiest houses, to the Zoological Gardens. They are really bare and ill-kept; but the beauty of the tropical vegetation reigns supreme everywhere, and we were charmed by all the curious shrubs and plants, trees and flowers, new to us—so common here, with the rich pink and crimson of the huge hybiscus bushes, and the purple and yellow of the allamandas, so like the gloxsinia, that I mistook it at first. The collection of animals includes some of our common brown ducks, guinea-fowls, and deer. We saw an albino idiot monkey, that chattered and mumbled to himself, gesticulating from the corner of the cage; also a shed full of cockatoos, and two splendid orange-colour ourang-outangs. Their name of ourang-outang is the Malay for "The Man of the Wood."

There was a pretty tropical scene looking down the stream with jungle, where some natives were tumbling and splashing about in the water. We passed the marble palace belonging to the commander-in-chief, the principal Dutch church, with its dome and latticed window, and drove on to Waterloo Plain. The Government buildings, a row of ugly whitewashed houses, without so much as a projecting cornice, or scrap of ornamented plaster-work, forms one side of the square. Just opposite is the hideous thick pillar, with the stunted beast at the top, erected to the joint memory of the Dutch and Belgians who fell at Waterloo. The inscription and joint dedication is intended as a "sop" to the pride of the Belgians, and as a false exaltation of themselves as a nation before the Javanese, for no mention is made of English or Prussians. The barracks are here; and the officers' quarters—pretty bungalows—surround the other three sides of the Waterloo Plain. As we came home the Königsplein was crowded with smart victorias and landaus, drawn by the fine carriage-horses that are imported from Australia. The native coachmen and footmen wear liveries of black and scarlet-striped cottons with turbans, two syces standing up behind, with fly-wisps, and ready to rush to the horses' heads at the slightest sign of restiveness. For instance, they always jump off at the approach of a steam train (for there are steam tramways in Batavia), and the native coachmen invariably look afraid of their horses. A few people have been foolish enough to put their Malay coachmen into tall hats, with gold lace, when the turban and black face peeping out from underneath looks utterly ridiculous. The Dutch ladies never think of driving or walking in hat or bonnet, and the smartly dressed ladies that we passed, with their round, pasty, good-natured faces, were all bareheaded. The gentlemen, too, go about with gloves and stick, but no hat.

As we passed the Weltervreden Station, there was a hearse waiting outside for the arrival of the train. The driver, with "ducks" and black hat with white band, and the six little "rats," covered entirely by long black clothes, produced a somewhat curious effect. Gay crowds were strolling along the shady canals, which are the "boulevards" of Batavia, as we returned home, forming a bright parti-coloured stream and strange mixture with the vivid colours and olive skins of the Javanese and Malays, and the white faces and ordinary European clothing of the Dutch. There are only forty-five English in Batavia, but they are very energetic amongst themselves with their racing, cricket, tennis and theatrical clubs; they also have a pretty church, but no clergyman at present.

I cannot say much for the domestic comfort produced by the combination of Dutch and Malay customs. Our room is large and airy, with French windows. Bamboo matting covers the floor, but it is not made in strips, but plaited in one piece to the size of the room. A row of pegs on a stand, covered with white curtains, forms a cupboard. The beds are swathed in mosquito-curtains, which are let down from their tortoise-shell hooks early in the afternoon. Indeed they are sorely needed by the evening, and you only feel safe when within their grateful shelter from the plague of insects, not only mosquitoes, that swarm in when the candles are lighted. They penetrate everywhere, more particularly nesting in one's hair-brushes; and I have had to give up writing near the light on account of the number falling and leaving their trails in the wet ink of the letters! But the beds are most interesting. There is not a vestige of sheet, or blanket, or counterpane on them, but in the centre of each bed lies the "Dutch wife." This bolster is placed with the object of providing a cool substance to lie against, one side being turned over when the other becomes hot.

They do not understand here the true meaning of a bath, but you have to descend to one of the tiled rooms, where there is a wooden tub, with a tin pot with which to throw the water over you. The lamps in the passages are a series of glass tumblers, with a wick and some oil floating in them.

Monday, December 22nd.—We must be truly grateful for the fine morning which we have, as the wet season is now here.

Life at Batavia seems to be a dolce far niente existence, a very easy, lazy life adapted to the climate. We could see this in the costume of the ladies appearing at the breakfast-table.

They have the reprehensible habit of wearing the "saronga" and "kabayah." The sarongs, or sarong, is a bright-coloured square of calico, with an oriental pattern in black and orange. The natives wear the same to all appearance, but there is really a great difference in their texture and manufacture, the good ones being woven by hand, and coloured by a laborious process of laying on the colour separately in oil for each line of the red, black, and yellow pattern. I was surprised to learn that these sarongs, which look like cheap Birmingham or Manchester wares—as indeed the common ones are, being specially manufactured for the Malay market—cost as much as from fifteen to twenty guilders. This sarong is wrapped tightly round the figure as a short petticoat; and worn with the kabayah, or loose cotton bed-jacket, with bare legs and feet slipped into heelless slippers. Many ladies wear their hair down in this costume, and when sitting at table they present the appearance of being in their night garments. The sarong in hotels as well as in private life is worn, not only at breakfast, but also at the "reis tag." The strange transformation that takes place at five, when these same strange negligés figures appear with their hair coiled up in the latest fashion, and "clothed" (and "in their right minds," I might add) is wonderful to behold. Then the ladies go for their drive in the park, and spend the evening in paying visits, going from one house to another as they see their friends are at home by the brilliancy of additional light in the verandah, and the carriages waiting outside. Their life, it seems to me, consists of the very early morning and the darkness of night, for in this equatorial latitude the light is the same all the year round; there is no twilight, but darkness falls almost suddenly from a quarter to half-past six.

There is a great deal of pleasant society in Batavia. Rich Dutch merchants who have come out in their earlier years to make money, go home to settle; but the cold gloom of Holland sends them back to warmth and tropical life in Java. Though Java is to the Dutch what India is to us, unlike our Indian officials, who stay in India but to make enough money to go home to England, the Dutchman lives and returns to die in his adopted home.

This morning we had a victoria with a pair of rats to drive down to the English Consulate, some three miles off, and which lies on the commercial wharfs. I sat outside watching the ships being slowly towed up the canals, and the lading and unlading of the merchandise on to bullock-carts. Much of the charm of the streets of Batavia consists in the mixture of races, with their various national costumes.

We drove first through China Camp, that most quaint and picturesque of towns within a town. Wherever the Chinese go—that is all the world over—you find that there they cluster together, and form their own quarter. The different trades of carpentering, shoemaking, umbrella-making, &c., are all carried on on a counter exposed to the streets; even the barbers' shops are open, and you see "John" in the different stages of being lathered, shaved, and of having his pigtail plaited with white, blue, or red cords that fringe and lengthen its wispy end. The top of the head requires shaving as often as his face (which is always kept hairless, and which gives to it the almost childlike look so common to John), because the growth of the pigtail is from the patch on the back of the head, and all round is clean shaven. China Town always reminds me of a rabbit warren, there seem to be so many Chinamen swarming in and out of the little huts, and about the confined quarters. All so active and busy about their own concerns, all living on a handful of rice—no wonder they succeed where others fail, with their ceaseless energy and thrifty habits. We passed by numbers of fascinating little Chinese tea-gardens, walled round and approached by a drive; the balconies and roofs were gilded and ornamented with porcelain flowers of blue and green, and made to look as attractive as possible. We saw, too, the vague, dark interiors of several joss-houses. Numbers of mangy dogs were snuffing about, and bantam-cocks were plentiful, for cock-fighting is a favourite amusement with the Chinese.

The lower end of the town seemed consecrated to the undertakers, for the curious wooden coffins, copies of the ancient sarcophagi of the Greeks, were lying in piles before the doors. The Chinese devote a great deal of thought and attention to their coffins, and keep them in readiness for years in their houses. Forges abounded too, for the Chinese are celebrated as the best blacksmiths of the world.

The Javanese are distinguished from the Malays by the black locks of matted hair escaping from under the turban; but both Javanese and Malay dress in the same fashion. The bright-coloured sarong is the only garment worn, or sometimes only a short pair of "inexpressibles," when the large bamboo "soup-plate" hat looks ridiculously large by comparison with the slim brown figure beneath its mighty shade. Sometimes the bamboo hat is replaced by an oval piece of wood, with a rim fitting the head inside, and the colouring of these wooden hats is most fanciful, red and green, or bronze with yellow stripes. A Malay of higher rank would add to the sarong a loose white jacket, and a turban. These turbans are formed of a gay pocket-handkerchief cleverly wound to the shape of the head, with two corners twisted in front to form a pair of horns. You hardly see a Malay without the pole slung across the shoulder, with the two plaited bamboo baskets or trays, containing anything and everything, suspended at the end. The butcher goes about from door to door with his meat and chopper in them; the baker with his bread; more often you see the bright scarlet of the chili on the tray; and all the marketing is done with these bamboo baskets.

They stagger along, with their long legs bending under the weight of the baskets, always appearing on the point of sinking, and yet managing to struggle on yet a little further, and they really go like this for miles. But the natural walk of the natives, how splendidly free and easy it is, as they swing along the street with limbs unconfined, and free play given to their bare feet! Many of the faces we saw were seamed and wrinkled with such characteristic lines and marks, and all have rather a wild, fierce look. What wonderful combinations of colour, too, we saw in the streets—such daring blendings of sage green with orange, pink with crimson, scarlet with purple; and I see that after all our latest fashionable colour, "crushed strawberry," has long been a prevailing hue with the Javanese.

There were the bright sarongs of the Malays, with the dark indigo-blue workaday suit of active John Chinaman, the long robe of bright green or blue of the Armenians (for there are many of them here), with the delicate pink and green of the Chinese ladies daintily picking their way along shaded with their paper umbrellas.

The Malanese and Javanese women wear the sarong equally with the men. A loose calico jacket of bright colours (cherry and pink being preferred) is worn over it, open at the throat and waist. They are small of stature, and have a nut-brown skin, with almond-shaped eyes, black and twinkling. Their shining black hair is worn in the smooth knot at the back, that is deftly twisted in such a way that no hair-pins are required to secure it. Many of the married women have their front teeth cut off at the roots, and this is done by a careful husband when his wife is inclined to become "fast," to remind every one that she is a married woman.