Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate Novara Volume Ii Part 10

The last days of our stay at Batavia we devoted to an inspection of various public inst.i.tutions. First of all we carefully examined the barracks, which present several points of special interest. Major Smits was so kind as to accompany us over the extensive grounds, in which were at the time some 800 men. The soldiers are all volunteers, and consist of about 250 whites, and 600 of the various coloured races of the Malay Archipelago. The white troops sleep in beds, the coloured upon wooden settles covered with mosquito-nets. Each soldier is allowed to have his wife beside him, and it is affirmed that this extraordinary practice tends to make them more orderly and regular, by accustoming them more speedily to life in the barrack, which thus becomes for them a sort of small town!

The women for their part prove highly serviceable as cooks, washerwomen, vendors of edibles, &c., and manage a sort of small market for each company, where the soldier can find everything he may require for satisfying his usually very moderate wants.

Major Smits ordered a number of the soldiers, representatives of the most important Malay types, to be submitted to a series of anthropometrical measurements, and made a present to the Expedition of a number of objects of ethnographical interest.

In company with Dr. Steenstra Toussaint, an ardent and amiable companion, we visited the various prisons, and the Loar-Badang,[66] of evil repute, which will be discussed in the medical section of the _Novara_ publications.

The prisons of Batavia stand in much need of reform, especially as regards construction, management, and treatment. The humane sentiments that characterize our century, have more care even for a robber or murderer than to load him with chains, and make him still more dangerous to society, by lengthened confinement within the thick lofty walls of a prison. There are two categories, into which all criminals in Java are divided, those who during the entire term of their sentence are to remain within the prison, and those who during the day are employed outside the prison on the public works, most of whom wear an iron ring round their neck, or chains on their hands or feet, whence they are usually termed "chain-gang" prisoners.

In the city Bridewell, where the criminals serve their sentences in cells, there is room for 200, and at the time of our visit there were 70 male and two female prisoners in confinement. The disagreeable impression made at finding such an establishment located in an exceedingly unhealthy site, is anything but diminished when the visitor perceives that it consists mainly of a large number of narrow corridors and high walls running parallel with each other at short distances, between which the prisoners, in divisions of from six to ten, are confined in small cells, two occasionally inhabiting the same cell. Those condemned to imprisonment for debt are shut up in a special compartment, apart from the common run of criminals, but in respect of accommodation and general treatment are in no respect better off than the latter. The law permits the incarceration of a debtor for three years, but the creditor is compelled to pay 10 guilders a month (10 per annum), to defray the cost of his maintenance. It is ill.u.s.trative of the Chinese character, and its speculative propensities, that hardly any of that nation are to be found on the criminal side, whereas they furnish the longest quota of those imprisoned for debt. We saw one Javanese woman, who of her own free will submitted to be imprisoned with her husband who had been condemned to several years'

incarceration, although she could only communicate with him in the presence of witnesses, and had to live in an entirely different part of the building.

In the prison where the "chain-gangers" were confined, there were 170 prisoners.[67] Owing to the circ.u.mstance that those committed in Batavia are draughted off to the prisons in the interior, while those sentenced in the provinces are sent to fulfil their sentences in the prisons of Batavia, the stranger encounters in these latter numerous peculiar types of natives from the various districts of Java and the adjoining islands, and this rare opportunity was made use of by myself and Dr. Schwarz to obtain some corporeal measurements of individuals presenting the characteristics of their respective races, as had already been done in the barracks.

Dr. Toussaint presented the Expedition with several pathological preparations, as also with one curiosity rather of historical than scientific interest, namely, the skull of a man, found a few years before in the maw of a shark which had been picked up dead at sea!

A very singular impression was left on us by a visit we paid to "Meester Cornelis," a sort of bazaar in the outskirts of Batavia, where a singular phase of life may be seen nightly in full activity. On a wide open square are a large number of booths, in which are sold all sorts of eatables and drinkables, while there is at the same time no lack of dancing-girls, Javanese musicians, opium-dens, gambling "h.e.l.ls," and other breeding-places of human depravity. The majority of its frequenters are Chinese, who spend here in the most extravagant manner what they have earned during the day. They especially affect the filthy little closets, where for a couple of doits (a halfpenny English) they can lie stretched out in a pitiable state of stupefaction, the result of opium-smoking, but are likewise by no means backward in patronizing the gambling booths. A group of these half-naked children of the Celestial Empire, seated in a circle on the ground amid the flare of torches and lamps, each holding in his lean hand a pair of greasy, well-worn cards, and with a little heap of copper or silver pieces spread out before him, following the chances of the game with a wild eagerness that makes him utterly heedless of what is pa.s.sing around him, presents a spectacle of such powerful interest, that the beholder, especially if a foreigner, likes to remain amid a scene so peculiar, despite its repulsiveness. The most melancholy consideration perhaps of all is that this form of dissipation seems by no means indigenous to Java, but was first introduced with many other forms of vice under the influence of foreign civilization.

For the observant traveller, a visit to such so-called "places of amus.e.m.e.nt" possesses a far deeper interest than theatres or operas, which one may see and hear among the various settlements in this Archipelago.

Such wandering companies, even those which are as highly remunerated as the "troupes" who minister to the aesthetic tastes of the wealthy inhabitants of the countries beyond sea,[68] or rather to an indispensable fas.h.i.+on, must awaken among European visitors melancholy reminiscences of vanished triumphs of art. Thus Batavia, during our stay, could boast a French operatic company. The theatre, lofty and airy, though of but one storey, without either boxes or gallery, had far more the appearance of a concert-room than a regular theatre. The rather heavy cost was defrayed by lotteries, which were set on foot by the Colonial Government from time to time for the behoof of the funds of the theatre. Several of the "cantatrices" carry on simultaneously with their engagements a lucrative business in French articles for the toilette, while the men-singers give instruction in vocalization, by which they not merely eke out their living, but contribute handsomely to the annoyance of their next-door neighbours.

There is but little sociability in Batavia. The people live in a thoroughly retired manner, each usually receiving only a small circle of friends in his own house. On this point, as on many others, our _own_ experience is _directly contrary_ to the actual state of matters, seeing that during our entire stay one invitation followed on the heels of another;--but those who live here for years together, even under the most favourable auspices, have repeatedly a.s.sured us that life in Batavia is unsociable and tedious.

This is the misfortune of all countries "beyond sea," where Europeans do not settle permanently, but flock thither with the intention, after a certain number of years of industry and activity, of returning home with a fortune made by their own personal exertions. We see this in Brazil, in the West Indies, in the Western coast of South America; in a word, in all tropical or sub-tropical countries where, on account of climatic considerations, the greater part of the European population is changed every ten years, and is recruited by fresh arrivals from Europe. How out of place, accordingly, does social or intellectual life appear in such countries, as compared with the colonies settled in temperate climates, in North America, at the Cape, in Australia, in New Zealand, in all of which the immigrant population is of a fixed character, building up for themselves a second home, and clinging with love and grat.i.tude to the soil that gives them sustenance, and on which their sons will grow up, under the invigorating influences of free inst.i.tutions, into free, prosperous, self-relying men!

Even in Batavia the majority of the European residents change every eight or ten years; instances such as that of Colonel von Schierbrand, of men who during 30 years have never once left the island, never yet seen a railroad, being of rare occurrence.

Of the numerous friends whom we were so fortunate as to make during our stay in Java, and to whom such heart-felt thanks are due for their hospitality and the warm interest they took in the objects of our Expedition,[69] many have since left the island for ever, and by their return to Europe left many a lamentable vacancy.[70] The more deserving of acknowledgment is the constant endeavour of the present Colonial Government to attract to itself fresh intelligence, and so not alone stimulate the scientific activity of the present, but also provide for the filling up of the various posts by properly qualified persons. The magnificent and expensive works which have been published of late years in Java by men of science, are the splendid fruit of that n.o.ble-minded support, and it is much to be regretted that the Government does not extend this liberality to their _political_ system,--that despite the glorious example in their own immediate neighbourhood of the results of English Free Trade, Government still cramps the energies of the colony with monopolies and privileges, and thereby checks the development of a country, which, alike by its position and its manifold natural advantages, bids fair to be one of the wealthiest and most prosperous countries in the world.

At seven A.M. on the 29th May, the _Novara_ weighed anchor in the roads of Batavia, after a stay of 23 days. Our next visit was to be paid to the Philippine Archipelago,--to the flouris.h.i.+ng island of Luzon, or rather to Manila, the most important settlement in the entire group. This was the pleasantest trip throughout the whole voyage. The distance, some 1800 nautical miles, was achieved in 17 days, with delightful weather, and balmy south-west monsoons.[71] By the 14th June we were in sight of the coast of Luzon, and on the following day we ran on before the freshening monsoon into the broad, beautiful gulf of Manila. As we pa.s.sed between the rock La Monja (the Nun) and "El Corregidor," or Governor's Island, which lie right in the channel, we met the _Cleopatra_, a large English screw-steamer, which had a freight of 1150 Chinese, who were to be imported into the Havanna as so-called "free" labourers. These poor wretches came from Amoy, and, as we afterwards learned, had been put on board so scantily provided, and so little cared for by the authorities, that thus early, during the voyage from Amoy to Manila, only 700 miles, eleven of these "pa.s.sengers" had died, and the captain found himself compelled to bear up for the nearest harbour in consequence of a sort of malignant fever having broken out on board, so virulent that there were deaths occurring almost every day. We shall treat more particularly of this hideous trade in men, which is chiefly carried on by the Portuguese, when describing our visit to Macao.

The Bay of Manila is a beautiful land-locked basin, of such splendid proportions that when we had pa.s.sed Governor's Island the city of Manila was still below the horizon. We anch.o.r.ed on the afternoon of 18th June in the harbour of Cavite (seven nautical miles south of Manila), because during the S.W. monsoon this harbour is more sheltered, and therefore safer for s.h.i.+ps, than the shallow open roadstead of the capital. Cavite, which boasts a fort, an a.r.s.enal, a dockyard, and a cigar manufactory, lies on a low, narrow tongue of land projecting into the bay. Whoever may have first set foot at Cavite, on the soil of the Island of Luzon, so renowned for its natural magnificence of scenery, must involuntarily feel that his antic.i.p.ations have been sorely disappointed; he will with all possible diligence make the best of his way from the glaring white sands and black walls of the fortress here to Manila, the next object of our hopes. A small screw plies daily between Cavite and the last-named city, and this vessel also conveyed the Expeditionists from Cavite to the capital of the Philippine Archipelago.

FOOTNOTES:

[34] Several copies of these various publications of the different scientific societies of Java were presented to the Expedition by the members of these learned bodies.

[35] Still the chief article of cultivation is rice, which const.i.tutes almost the sole bread-stuff of the Javanese. Crauford in his admirably digested dictionary of the Indian Archipelago calculates that the annual rice crop is about 500,000,000 lbs., and that each individual consumes annually one quarter, or 480 lbs.!

[36] For some extremely beautiful and costly weapons used by the Malay races we are especially indebted to Mr. J. Netscher, one of the directors of the Society of Arts and Sciences, a profound scholar in the various idioms spoken in Java, and who on the same occasion enriched our collections with some of his own valuable numismatic specimens and philological researches, and to this day neglects no opportunity of advancing the special objects of our Expedition.

[37] Only two of the various races of Java have remained constant to the belief of their fathers, and still honour, some of them Buddha, some Brahma. Among these are the Badawis, who const.i.tute all that remain of a once mighty race at the east end of the island, among the hills of Kendang in the Residency of Bandang, on the Tenggers, also at the east of the island in the Residency of Pa.s.seruwan, the former numbering 1500, the latter about 4000 souls.

[38] Garsick, the Grisse of modern days, was the first spot where these jealous sectaries settled about the year 1374, and the two Arabic sheikhs Dulla and Moellana are usually cited by later historians as the introducers of the Mahometan wors.h.i.+p into Java.

[39] There are at present two kings reigning on the Island of Lombok: Ratu Agong Agong Suede Carang-a.s.sem, and Ratu Agong Agong Made Carang-a.s.sem.

These had submitted under special treaties to the Dutch Government, whose va.s.sals they now are.

[40] Yellow is the royal colour of the Ruler of Lombok. According to the prevalent custom, no one but the king and members of his family is permitted to use that colour in their dress or ornaments.

[41] This peculiarity of Eastern manners is universally prevalent wherever Oriental nations have come in contact with Europeans. It is of course as entirely unlike the genuine hospitality of the rude Bedouin or Tartar as it is possible to imagine, and seems to belong to an early and very imperfect notion of true refinement. Traces of it will be found in all countries, even in Europe, and in its original form of making a present in the expectation of receiving something more valuable in return, which lies at the bottom of all this pseudo-generosity. The astuteness of the Scotch Highlanders, themselves a race remarkably free from such meannesses, has. .h.i.tched the system into a pithy proverb, the sense of which is to "send a hen's egg in order to get a goose's in exchange."

[42] 73.75 paals (posts) are equal to one degree of the equator, whence one paal = within a small fraction of 4943 feet 6 inches. This method of indicating land-measure originated in the circ.u.mstance that on every road intersecting Java from west to east, the respective distances from the three chief places, Batavia, Samarang, and Surabaya, are marked up upon wooden "paale" or posts.

[43] As yet there are no railroads on the island. But a company has been formed with the intention of uniting the more important and productive districts of the island, an enterprise which will extend to about 1000 miles (English), and will cost about 8,500,000.

[44] It is well known that Holland in former days recruited her black regiments of the Netherland Indies by men from the Gold Coast, and in fact had set on foot a sort of traffic in men with the king of Ashantee.

[45] Dr. Junghuhn, in his admirable work upon Java, describes the rainy season--which usually has fairly set in by the month of January, when the westerly and north-westerly winds are driving the rain-clouds before them--in the following spirited language:--"The floods stream from the clouds often for four-and-twenty hours at a stretch without the slightest interruption, and with such violence that the noise of the plash of the falling element drowns the voices of the inhabitants, compelled as they are to keep to their houses. Every brook and river overflows its banks, covering with a tide of muddy brown water the alluvial soil wrested from the bed of ocean, while the frogs croak incessantly day and night, and the lizards and snakes emerge from their holes, and creep into every corner of the dwellings of every man; all through the hours of darkness is heard the loud thousand-voiced hum of insects, of myriads of mosquitoes, till it is hardly possible to find a dry place throughout the house. The hot, sultry air is saturated with moisture, so that everything becomes damp, in consequence of the fine particles of the rain-vapour penetrating into the inmost corners of the house."

[46] p.r.o.nounced _Chipannas_ (hot stream), from _Tji_, water, and _Pannas_, hot. _Tji_ is always p.r.o.nounced like _chi_, and _oe_ like _oo_.

[47] One can form some idea of the enormous fecundity of this insect, if we mention that it takes 200,000 in a dried state to make one pound of the cochineal of commerce.

[48] Two Vanilla plants, imported in 1841 from the Botanical Garden of Leyden, remained barren for nine years, till recourse was at last had to the system of artificial fructification, upon which these plants increased so rapidly that the plants at present under cultivation at Pondok-Gedeh amount to 700,000!

[49] Now named _Cankrienia Chrysantha_. The plant most characteristic of this region was the _gnaphalium arboreum_.

[50] These four species were _Cinchona Calisaya_, _C. Condanimea_, _C.

Lanceolata_, and _C. Ovata_.

[51] According to our latest advices from Java, which extend to November, 1860, there are at present in the Preanger Regency upwards of 100,000 China plants in the very best order, so that this valuable commodity not only may be regarded as fully naturalized in that island, but the Dutch Government even complied with the request of the British Government for a certain number of seedlings for introduction into India.

[52] p.r.o.nounce _Tschipodas_ and _Tschangschoor_ (Sweet Water) respectively.

[53] Called in the Sunda dialect Gunung Masigit, or Hill of the Mosque, in consequence of the chalk, of which it is composed, being broken into pinnacles of remarkable uniformity, and strongly resembling the appearance presented by the minarets of a mosque.

[54] As these edible swallows'-nests form a very important article of commerce among the Colonial products, and their collection provides the means of subsistence to a considerable section of the population of Java, we shall follow here the description given by Dr. Junghuhn, in his truly cla.s.sic Monograph upon Java, in which (Book I. p. 468) he speaks as follows respecting the marvellous abodes selected by this species of swallow, and the perils dared by the native in obtaining their nests. "In Karangbolong, a portion of the entrance to the holes where the swallows breed is on a level with the surface of the water, and at times covered by the sea. In one of these cavities, the Gua Gede, the edge of the coast-wall rises 80 Paris feet above low water, in a concave form, so that it actually overhangs; however, at an elevation of about 25 feet there occurs a projection, which the Rotang-ladder reaches by being suspended perpendicularly. The ladder is made by two side ropes of reed, which every inch-and-a-half, or two inches, are bound to each other by cross-bars of wood. The roof of the entrance to the cave is only 10 feet above the sea, which even at ebb-tide washes the flow throughout its extent, while at flood-tide the mouth of the cave is entirely closed by the sweep of the rollers. Only during ebb-tide therefore, and with perfectly smooth water, is it possible for any one to penetrate into the interior. Even then this would be impossible, were not the rocky vault, or roof of the cavern, pierced through, eaten away, and corroded into innumerable holes. By the projecting angles of these holes it is that the strongest and most daring gatherer who first makes his way in, has to hold on, while he attaches to them ropes made of Rotang, which thus hang from the roof to a length of four or five feet. At their lower extremities other Rotang ropes are securely fastened crosswise, thus running, rather more horizontally, parallel with the roof, so that they form a hanging bridge as it were along the whole length of the roof. The roof is about 100 feet wide, and from the entrance at the south to the deepest recess in the north end, the cave is about 150 feet in length. Although only 10 feet high at the entrance, the roof becomes gradually more and more lofty as the cavern retreats, till at the farthest extremity it is about 20 to 25 feet above the sea-level. Before any one of the nest-hunters proceeds to erect his ladder, and again before proceeding to climb up upon it in such fearful proximity to the thundering swell, a solemn prayer is proffered to the G.o.ddess or queen of the sea-coast, whose blessing is invoked. At this place she bears the name of _Nja-Ratu-Segor-Kidul_, or sometimes _Ratu-Loro-Djunggrang_, and has dedicated to her in the village of Karangbolong a temple, which is kept scrupulously clean. Occasionally the gatherers make also a solemn sacrifice at the tomb of _Serot_, who, according to a Javanese legend, is revered as the first discoverer of the bird-nest caves." (The meaning of the above Javanese words is as follows: _Nja_, the t.i.tle of honour of a female, corresponding to our "Madame:"--_Ratu_, Queen:--_Segoro_, ocean:--_Kidul_, south:--_Lero_, maiden:--_Djunggrang_ is a surname.) Compare "Java, its physical Features, Vegetation, and internal Structure," by Franz Junghuhn. Leipsig, Arnold, 1842.

[55] The picul varies in weight between 125 and 133-1/3 pounds.

[56] Toestand der aangeweekete Kinabomen op het eiland Java in het laatst der Maand Julij, en het begni van Augustus, 1857. Kort beschreven door F.

Junghuhn, 116 pp.

[57] At all events, among the planters up the country the opinion prevails that the coffee beans prepared by the native population on what is called the parching method are of far finer and more durable quality than those prepared by the former process.

[58] Professor Vriese, besides having all expenses paid, drew a salary of 1000 per annum, besides 10 guilders (16_s._ 8_d._) a day for every day pa.s.sed by him in the interior of the island while engaged in its explorations.

[59] The commercial and statistical particulars of Java, for which we are mainly indebted to the kindness of Mr. Fraser, the Austrian Consul in Batavia, will be specially considered in a different part of the work.

[60] The Javanese agriculturist, especially the coffee planter, is sadly tormented by three kinds of gra.s.s, which Dr. Junghuhn has named the Javanese Trinity, and which are invariably found with the coffee plant--_Erichthitas Valerianifolia_ (which was introduced from Mocha with the coffee-shrub, and was never before known in Java), _Agerahun Conisodes_, and _Bideus Sundaica_. The civet-cat, too (called _Luah_ in Javanese, Jjaruh in the Sunda language), does great damage to the coffee plantations, just as the crop is being collected. It eats only the fleshy part of the brown berry, the beans, at least according to what the Javanese say, actually gaining a flavour by the process to which they are subjected in the maw of the animal!

[61] In 1859 the most important of the colonial products, grown for account of the Government, presented the following quant.i.ties:--

Coffee piculs 727,000 (of 125 lbs. each) Sugar " 901,000.

Indigo 558,800 lbs.

Ca.s.sia 256,000 "

Cochineal (a failure in the crops owing to incessant rains) 6,700 "