LETTERS OF A JAVANESE PRINCESS
front seat of the carriage with his wife on the back seat, and next to her Father who had met them at the station.
I knew that Father would never have sat there without being pressed. You would have seen nothing remarkable in this, and you will laugh at me when I say that it impressed me very much, because it spoke of the modesty of the Director, and told me that he was a stranger to all the self important airs and painful respect which so many officials here demand. I was accustomed to seeing Father on the left side of Resident or Assistant Resident, never mind how much younger the latter might be.
But not only I, Europeans even are seriously annoyed by the silly regulations of rank here. The newly arrived European officials and the Regents take their places upon chairs while the cold ground covered (and sometimes uncovered) with a bamboo mat, is good enough for a native wedono, who has grown grey in the service.
The most petty European sits upon a chair, while native officials of any age, who are below the rank of regent, though they are often of distinguished ancestry, must sit upon the floor in their presence.
It certainly does not please the heart to see a grey wedono creep upon the ground before a young aspirant,[1] a youth who may have just left the school benches. But enough of that, it was only to explain why the courtesy of the Director, a man of such high authority, struck me so forcibly.
We heard the Director say to Father, "I have been all over Java and have talked with many chiefs, Regent. You have set the example by sending your girls to school. I have asked girls who were going to the grammar schools if they would like to go on with their studies, and they have all answered enthusiastically "Yes."
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- ↑ An "aspirant" is the lowest in rank among the Dutch ofBcials in Java.
