Letters of a Javanese Princess Part 18

I have thought and experienced all that you wrote me. Long ago, in the very beginning of our close a.s.sociation, I said many times to the sisters, I begged and implored them, to tear themselves loose from me, and not to allow themselves to depend so wholly upon me.

For who am I, presumptuous fool, to calmly lead and allow my little sisters to follow me? I am going on strange unknown ways, which will lead toward heaven, but must first take me down into h.e.l.l. This last, much more easily than the first. h.e.l.l is near, and the way to it is lighted: but heaven is so far off and difficult to find.

"Yes," say my sisters, "But neither you nor any one else, could sow the seeds of ideas in us, so that they would bear fruit, unless the soil were suited to them. We are going together whether it be to heaven or to h.e.l.l." My beautiful faithful little souls; no, they have learned nothing from me, for I have always been their pupil. Oh, they have taught me much.

We are one in ideas and feelings, everything has combined to make us one. We have been together all our lives; though you can take away the long years that we lived together but outwardly and count only these last intimate years.

Souls that have dwelt together for only one moment in great sympathy, can never wholly forget one another. But we have dwelt together in complete harmony for years. The years have added to the bond ten-fold.

We see the same things, hear the same things, day after day, and talk over everything with one another. We take delight in the same things, read books, magazines and newspapers together--discuss what we have read, and exchange opinions and ideas. Our parents see our intimacy with pleasure and encourage in every way. They are so pleased with the three-in-one idea that they are sometimes unjust to those outside, for the triple bond must come before everything else.

Our protectors as you know may marry us to whomsoever they will. The only circ.u.mstances in which they may not compel our obedience, is when the candidate for our hand is of a rank inferior to our own. Parents may not compel their daughters to marry a man who is beneath them in station. That is our only weapon against their arbitrary will.

The prospective bridegroom has only to go with the father or other male relative to the Panghoeloe[2] or some one else of the kind, and the wedding is over. The girl may know nothing whatever about it at the time.

Mother knew a woman, who refused to marry. She said she had rather die than marry the man her parents had chosen for her. Heaven was merciful, three months before the date set for the wedding the cholera took her away. Had she lived, no one would have been disturbed in the least by her refusal. She would have been married out of hand despite her protests.

There is nothing new under the sun; long ago in old times there were rebellious daughters too. It has always been preached to us that it was our duty to belong blindly to our parents. At the same time it has happened that when a young woman, submissive to their decree, was married, and afterwards unhappy, they would make sport of her and say: "Foolish one, why then did you marry? When you were married, you were willing, you wished to follow your husband; you must not complain now."

When I received your letter, we were about to go to a wedding. It is not customary for young girls to go to weddings and sit among the wedding guests, but Mamma graciously gave us her consent. If the bride's mother, an old friend of ours, had not pressed us to honour her with our presence at the great feast, we would have gladly stayed away. Before we started from our house, we saw the retinue of the bridegroom going toward the mosque; there was a downpour of rain, and the carriage in which the bridegroom sat was closed, as were the other carriages which followed it. Gold-striped banners were streaming over the aloen-aloen.[3] It was a melancholy-looking train; we were depressed by it. Indeed, it made us think of a funeral procession.

When we came to the home of the bride, we found her sitting in front of the quade (canopy) waiting for the bridegroom. Father went with us, too.

We sat on the ground close by the door; the eldest between the two little sisters. Incense and the perfume of flowers filled the room.

Gamelan music, and the soft buzzing of voices reached us from outside.

Gamelan broke into a song of welcome; the bridegroom was coming.

Two women seized the bride by the arms, lifted her up, and led her to meet the bridegroom, who was also being led toward her by two persons.

After a few steps, they are opposite each other and bride and bridegroom give, each one to the other, a rolled-up sirrih[4] leaf. A few steps nearer and both sink to the ground. The bride prostrates herself on her knees before him, as a symbol of her subjection to the man. Flat before him, she makes a respectful sembah, and humbly kisses his foot! Again, a submissive sembah, and both rise and go hand in hand and seat themselves under the canopy.

"Joe, Joe," whispered Kleintje to me with dancing eyes and a roguish twist to her mouth. "He! I should go wild, if I could only see a bridal pair come smiling to meet each other and hand the sirrih leaf with eyes sparkling with joy. Of course, that would have to be among the younger generation--a bridal pair who had known each other beforehand. Would not that be fine--eh, Joe? Will it ever happen? I should go crazy with delight, if I could ever see it."

"It will come," I said mechanically, and smiled; but in that room, I felt as though my heart were being pierced with a dagger; and there at my side, with face beaming and dancing eyes, sat my sister.

A few days ago I opened a book by chance, it happened to be Multatuli, and the first thing I read was "Thugater." I still seem to see the words before my eyes: "Father said to her, that to know, and to understand, and to desire, was a sin for a girl."

Certainly the great, genial writer had little idea when he wrote that, what a deep impression it would make some day upon one of the daughters of the people whom he loved, and for whose welfare he sacrificed so much.

There was a woman of the people who became wife number two of a native official. The first wife, who was not quite right in her head, after a little went away from him, leaving behind a whole troop of children.

Number two became the official wife and was a painstaking, loving mother to her step-children; she was very diligent and worked hard to save something from the income of her husband, so that later they would be able to educate his children. And it was thanks to her that the sons turned out so well. Now I come to the thanks. Once when her husband had gone to the city he came back home late at night, and called his wife outside. A guest had come with him for whom she must care, and make ready a room. The guest was a young woman, and when her husband told her that the guest was his wife and that she, his older wife, must thenceforth share everything with her, at first she was stunned, for she did not understand. She only stood and looked at him. But when the frightful truth penetrated to her brain, she sank without a single word to the ground. When she came to herself again, she rose to her feet, and asked, standing, for a writing of divorcement from her husband. At first he did not wish to understand her, but she persisted till at last he yielded and gave her the requested paper.

That very night she went out of the house on foot through fields and forests, to her parents' house in the city. How she got there she did not know. When she could think again, she was with her family and they told her that she had been ill for a long time.

Later, after she had recovered, she looked at the letter which she had forced from her husband on that terrible night, and saw that she was really not divorced at all. The letter merely contained her description and the information that she had run away from him.

He had no idea in the world of giving her back her freedom. Later she became reconciled to him. The other wife left the house and went to live in another dwelling, while she resumed her old rule of the household. On that frightful night, she had sworn a solemn oath, she swallowed dust, and vowed never, never, to raise her hand to deprive another of her rights. She had done it herself ignorantly as a child; when she was fourteen years of age, her parents had married her to her husband. She did not know what she was doing, she belonged only to her parents, who used often to beat her at their pleasure. She knew now what a h.e.l.l pain it was to be pressed from the side of a husband by another. She has remained true to her oath.

Not long ago her husband married a niece to some one who already had a wife; she defied the wrath of her husband and refused persistently to have anything to do with the wedding preparations, and the wedding was not held in her house.

We know her very well, and have great respect for her. She has made herself what she is by her own efforts, she has worked hard and improved herself, though she has never had an opportunity to study.

She has taught herself to read, and has worked her way through several books with profit.

We are sometimes astonished at her conversation, the result of deep thinking, and also of a sound understanding. She is truly an unusual woman (it would be well if there were more like her) who has had neither education nor opportunities, but who thinks and feels as we because she has known suffering.

Her history is not unique; there are many like it. But where shall I end if I once begin to tell you of the misery of the native women? Every one whose eyes are not blind and whose ears are not deaf, knows what goes on in our world. Pluck the heart from our bodies and the brains from our head if you wish to change us.

Long before you quoted from Zangwill's "Dreams of the Ghetto" to me Kleintje said almost the same thing, though of course in different words. We were eating tarts, or something of the kind, when little sister came running up and wished to have some too. There was no clean plate for her, and Kardinah said, "Eat off Joe's plate and then you will become clever like her," whereupon Kleintje said solemnly, "No, I will not do it; I want to remain stupid; to be clever is not to be happy--not for every one. It is a misfortune to be able to think and not to be able to act; to be able to know, to feel and to wish, and not to be free. I want to be only stupid."

Once when I was distraught with trouble, and leaned against the wall motionless, with wide open eyes that saw nothing, but only stared at the light, a cry of sorrow smote my ears and brought me back to a sense of reality. Father leaned over me, his arms were around me, though his face was turned away. "Do not give way like that, Ni. Have patience." Oh, my father, why have you not listened to the voice of your own heart; why have you heeded the voice of the world?

[1] To Mevrouw Abendanon.

[2] Servant of religion, in charge of a mosque.

[3] Grounds in front of a Regent's palace. Usually square in shape and surrounded by trees, sometimes with a group of trees in the center.

[4] Sirrih, the leaf of a vine. A paste composed of lime gamlier and betel nut is spread upon this and eaten by the Javanese women. It is customary for bride and bridegroom to present it to each other at weddings. The custom is of ancient origin.

XXIX

_December 31st, 1901._[1]

We do not want to sail any longer upon a weak ship, something must be done for this great, this unhappy cause. We should be satisfied if only the attention of the intelligent world were fastened upon it. Many times have I talked with women, both with those of the n.o.bles and those of the people, about the idea of an independent, free, self-supporting girl, who could earn her own living; and from each one comes the answer, "There must be some one who sets the example."

We are convinced that if one has but the courage to begin, many will follow her. There must always be a beginning. One must go first to show the way, and the example must be good; each one waits for the other; no one dares to be first. The parents too wait for one another to see which one will have the moral courage to allow a daughter to become independent and self supporting--to stand by herself.

We know a Regent's daughter, our own age, who is also full of enthusiasm for the idea of freedom. She is crazy to study; she speaks excellent Dutch, and has read a great deal. She is the daughter of the Regent of Koetoardjo. There are two great girls, charming children; we are very fond of them. I know from a teacher, an acquaintance of ours, that the older girl is crazy to study. She has told me herself that she is very anxious to go to Europe. The second sister also is a dear, clever child.

A few years ago they were at our house on a visit. When they first came, they began to draw and paint with us, and now the younger one paints very well. Their father has a great respect for an educated woman. We know another one of his daughters, who is married; she speaks no Dutch, but she has gone further than the others. She has a great admiration for the free, independent European woman; she would think it ideal if we could have the same conditions in our native world.

Another Regent's daughter has been here; she is a Sundanese girl; she does not speak a word of Javanese, but she was brought up with Europeans, so we talked in Dutch.

The first question that she asked me was, "How many mothers have you?" I turned to her in pained astonishment, and she went on (do not be shocked) "You know that I have fifty-three mothers and there are eighty-three of us. I do not know the majority of my brothers and sisters. I am the youngest, and never knew my father; he died before I was born."

Is not that deeply, deeply sad? In the Preanger, girls of n.o.ble birth are free to choose their own husbands, and many of them even know the man to whom they are betrothed. The young people meet one another, and become engaged after the European manner. Blessed land--and yet--!

There is a girl, a grand-daughter of a Regent, (her parents are dead) who has had a splendid bringing up, and if her teacher is a good judge, must be a wonder of learning. She plays the piano well, etc. She became engaged after the European manner and married some one, who had many wives, and a whole troop of children; some of them full grown. I knew one of her step-daughters, a charming little woman who speaks Dutch and is the mother of a two year old child. She was seventeen years old, a year or two younger than her step-mother. She told me that she chose her husband herself and was very happy.

The idea of publishing all that I think and feel about conditions among our Mohammedan women, has been with me for a long time. I thought of putting it into a book, in the form of letters between two regents'

daughters--a Sundanese and a Javanese. Already I have written several letters, but I shall not go on with it at present. It will be perhaps some years before I can finish it, but I shall not give up the idea.

That too was suggested by Mijnheer. The great difficulty is that father would not allow me to publish such a book. "It is good for you to be versed in the Dutch language," says Father, "but you must not make that an excuse for telling your inmost thoughts."