Letters of a Javanese princess/Chapter 19
XIX[1]
10th June, 1901.
WE know what Borel has written on the gamelan (he calls it soul music). Do you know other things by him as well? "Het Jongetje" is charming. Many think Borel morbid and unwholesome, but we enjoy him. "De laatse incarnatie" is very fine, and his "Droom uit Tosari" is still finer, in that he writes of the wonderful natural beauty of Java's blue mountains. How much we enjoyed it! One must be an artist, or at least, have been subjected to a lively dose of artistic feeling to see and take pleasure in the beauties of Mother Nature, and to be able to express it in fine, clear style; such an one must be a dear privileged human child, upon whose forehead the muses have pressed a kiss.
I hope some day to have an opportunity to study your beautiful, musical language; I shall not let the chance go by without making use of it, you may be assured. To be able to read and write it would make me happy above everything. And if I should ever be so fortunate as to master the German language then I shall go and look for you. Will it not be a good idea? In the meantime flying machines will have come into use, and on some golden day you will see one of them flutter over Jena's blue horizon bringing a guest from afar!
I should indeed have been born a boy; then, perhaps, I should be able to carry out some of my high-flying plans. Now, as a girl, in our present native civilization, it is almost impossible to take a little walk down a turnpike. How can anything else be expected, when in Europe, the centre of civilization, and of enlightenment, the strife should have been so long and so bitter for the good right of the woman? Could one in earnest expect that India, uncivilized, unenlightened, slumbering India, should take it well that her daughters, women who through centuries had been looked upon as beings of a lower order—yes, why should I not say it—as soulless creatures, should suddenly be regarded as human beings, who have a right to independent ideas, to freedom of thought, of feeling and of conduct?
Alas! nothing will come of that splendid plan of the Government, from which we expected so much; nothing will come of it because the majority of native chiefs opposed it. Adieu illusions! Ah! I have often thought and repeated aloud, that dreams and ideals were useless ballast in our Native civilization, a superfluous and dangerous luxury! But that says the mouth alone, at the instigation of the cold understanding. It makes no impression upon that stupid crazy thing, the heart. For dreams of freedom have taken such deep root in our hearts, that they are never more to be uprooted without making desolate the soil from which they have sprung.
I think it is very good of you to give yourself such concern in regard to my future. I am deeply grateful. But oh, do you know nothing but sadness concerning me? We know what awaits us. We three are going hand in hand through life that for us will be full of struggle and disappointment! The way that we have chosen is certainly not strewn with roses; it is filled with thorns, but we have chosen it out of love, and with love and a joyous mind we shall follow it.
It leads to the raising of thousands and thousands of poor oppressed and down-trodden souls, our sisters; it leads toward freedom and happiness for millions. For our fellow countrymen too will inevitably be brought to a higher moral condition, and then they will work with us on that eternal work of striving for perfection. That giant's work at which through the centuries the noblest and best have toiled, trying to lead mankind upward toward the light, and in short, to bring our beautiful earth nearer to Heaven. Is not that worth striving for all one's life?
It is the dream of "Tiga Soedara," the three Javanese sisters in the distant sunny land. Oh, could we but go to the land of changing seasons, the land of warmth and cold, the fatherland of learning, to prepare ourselves there for the good light that we wish to make for the future happiness and well-being of our people. Above all the mind should be cultivated, before one can do good. Although people assert that to do good and to be intellectual are two different things; but I think that it takes the greatest wisdom to overcome the opposing forces that we human beings all feel in us, to temper them, and to regulate them so that they may work harmoniously together. I have seen so often that to try to do good ignorantly, does more harm than good.
Europe! Must you then remain always unattainable for us? We, who long for you with heart and soul.
But I do not believe in repining. Life is too beautiful—too splendid—to be wasted in complaints about things which can never be changed. Let us be thankful for the many blessings that the good God has bestowed upon us. Are we not fortunate above thousands and thousands of others, in the possession of our dear parents, good health, and in a number of little blessings, which make up the sum of our daily lives?
When we have enjoyed the music of singing birds then we are thankful that God has not created us deaf! When we are at Klein Scheveningen, that idyllic spot by the sea, where everything breathes quiet and peace, and watch the sun go down, then we know that we cannot be grateful enough that we have good eyes to enjoy the beautiful light which plays upon the golden water, and in the Heaven above it! and a still prayer of thanksgiving toward the invisible Great Spirit who created everything and governs everything — a joyful thanksgiving rises from my heart, thanksgiving that I may, and am able to see so much. For there are many who cannot. Not only the poor people to whom the days and nights are as one, an impenetrable blackness, but there are many who are in full possession of their faculties, yet never see.
And we realize how privileged we are above so many of our fellow men, and gratitude for all the blessings of the good God fills our souls. But is it not a sad thought that we must be reminded of the lack in others, in order to appreciate our own advantages?
There are many educated native women; many, many cleverer and more talented than we, who have been hampered not at all in the cultivation of their minds, who could have become anything that they would, and yet they have done nothing, have attempted nothing that could lead to the uplifting of their sex, and of their race. They have either fallen back wholly into the old civilization, or gone over to that of the Europeans; in both cases being lost to their people to whom they could have been a blessing, if they had but willed it. Is it not the duty of all those who are educated and on a higher plane to stand by with their greater knowledge and seek to lighten the way for those who are less fortunate? No law commands this, but it is a moral duty.
Forgive me if I have tired you by writing at too great length. How did I come to take up so much of your valuable time with the babble? Forgive me, but you yourself are not without blame; your two letters which are lying before me are so sympathetic; when I read their cordial words, it is as though I had you before me, and that is what I have imagined all the time that I have been writing.
That one of Java's volcanoes on the Eastern cape has broken out frightfully, and cost many lives, you will certainly have learned from others, so I shall not write of that. According to the papers, two other volcanoes are now active. Oh, inscrutable, beautiful blue mountains!
The eclipse of the sun on the 18th of May, for the observation of which scientists from all over the world came to Java, we could scarcely see here at all, owing to the unfortunate weather. The day was cloudy and there was, and is still rain. But what was vexation to us, was a blessing to the farmers! Father was made very happy by the good rain which refreshed the thirsty fields, and so much depends upon that. So much can depend upon a single shower of rain, woe or weal to hundreds, yes to thousands.
- ↑ To Professor and Mrs. G. K. Anton of Jena.