The port of Sourabaya, supreme in mercantile importance, ranks as the
second city of Java, as it contains the military headquarters, the
principal dockyards, and the arsenal. Leagues of rice and sugar-cane
lie between Solo and Sourabaya, the landscape varied by gloomy teak
woods, feathery tamarinds, and stately mango trees. White towns nestle
in rich vegetation, and the green common known as the _aloon-aloon_
marks each hybrid suburb, Europeanized by Dutch canals, white bridges,
and red-tiled houses, planted amid a riotous wealth of palm and banana.
A broad river, brimming over from the deluge of the previous night,
flows through burning Sourabaya; a canal, gay with painted _praus_
connecting it with the vast harbour, where shipping of all nations lies
at anchor, the sheltered roads bristling with a forest of masts and
funnels. Bungalows, in gorgeous gardens, flank dusky avenues of
colossal trees, for even Sourabaya, the hottest place in steaming Java,
enjoys "a boundless contiguity of shade." In the _sawa_ fields
broad-eaved huts, set on stilts above the swamp, protect the brown boys
who frighten birds from the rice, for the clapping and shouting must be
carried on under shelter from the ardent sun. No air blows from the
rippling water, set with acres of lotus-beds, the fringed chalices of
rose and azure swaying on their plate-like leaves of palest green. The
heterogeneous character of Sourabaya gives unwonted interest to the
streets, uniquely brilliant in grouping and colour. Gilded eaves of
Chinese houses, many-tiered Arab mosques, encrusted with polished tiles
of blue and purple, white colonnades of Dutch bungalows, and pointed
huts of woven basket-work within wicker gate and bamboo fence, mingle
in fantastic confusion to frame a series of living pictures.
Cream-coloured bullocks and spirited Timor ponies, in creaking waggons
and ramshackle carriages, pass in endless procession. Bronze-hued
coolies balance heavy loads on the swaying _pikolan_, a sloping pole of
elastic bamboo, and strolling players, rouged and tinselled, collect
crowds in every open space where a fluttering tamarind-tree offers a
welcome patch of shadow to each turbaned audience, clad in the
paradisaical garb of the tropics. Graceful Malay women flit silently
past, in pleasing contrast to their burly Dutch mistresses, clad in a
caricature of native garb which the appalling heat of Sourabaya renders
a more slatternly disguise than even colonial _sans géne_ accomplishes
elsewhere. Orchids spread broad spathes of scented bloom from grey
trunks of courtyard trees, and cascades of crimson and purple creepers
tumble over arch and wall. Insinuating Chinamen untie bundles of
_sarongs_, scarves, and delicate embroideries on the marble steps of
hotel porticoes, where the prolonged "shopping" of the drowsy East is
catered for by the industrious Celestial, when _tokos_ are closed, and
the tradesman sleeps on the floor amid his piled-up wares, for the
slumber of Java is too deep to be lightly disturbed, and the solemnity
of the long siesta seems regarded almost as a religious function. In
this far-off land of dreams it seems "always afternoon," and the
complacency wherewith the entire population places itself "hors de
combat" becomes a perpetual irritation to the traveller, anxious to
seize a golden opportunity of fresh experience. The sun sinks out of
sight before the sultry atmosphere begins to cool. The weird "gecko," a
large lizard which foretells rain, screams "Becky! Becky!" in the
garden shadows, and a cry of "Toko! Toko!" echoes from another unseen
speaker of a mysterious language, while wraith-like forms of his tiny
brethren make moving patterns on the white columns, as the hungry
little reptiles hunt ceaselessly for the mosquitos which form their
staple diet. Lashing rain and deafening thunder at length cool the
fiery furnace, blue lightning flares on the solid blackness of heaven,
and the storm only dies away when we start at dawn for Tosari, the
mountain sanatorium of the Tengger. The flat and flooded land glows
with the vivid green of springing rice, tremulous tamarind and
blossoming teak bordering a road gay with pilgrim crowds, for the great
volcano of the Tengger remains one of Nature's mystic altars, dedicated
to prayer and sacrifice. Moslem girls in yellow veils jostle brown men
with white prayer-marks and clanking bangles. The _sari_ of India
replaces the _sarong_ of Java, with fluttering folds of red and purple;
children, clad only in silver chains and medals, or strings of blue
beads, dart through the crowd, from whence the familiar types of Malay
and Javanese personality are absent. We change carts in a busy roadside
_passer_, which drives a roaring trade in rice-cakes and fruit, syrups
and stews, to mount through changing zones of vegetation, where palms
give place to tree ferns, and luscious frangipanni or gardenia yields
to rose and chrysanthemum. From the half-way house of Poespo, a forest
road ascends to Tosari. Sombre casuarina, most mournful of the pine
tribe, mingles with teak and mahogany in dense woods falling away on
either side from the shadowy path. Innumerable monkeys swing from bough
to bough, eating wild fruits, and breaking off twigs to pelt the
intruders on their domains. At length the sylvan scenery gives place to
endless fields of cabbage, potatoes, maize, and onions, for the cool
heights of the Tengger range serve the prosaic purpose of market-garden
to Eastern Java, and all European vegetables may be cultivated here
with success. A patchwork counterpane of green, brown, and yellow,
clothes these steep slopes, but the extent of the mountain chain, and
the phantasmal outlines of volcanic peaks, absorb the incongruities
grafted upon them. Valerian and violet border the track between swarthy
pines with grey mosses hanging down like silver beards from forked
branches, and sudden mists shroud the landscape in vaporous folds, torn
to shreds by gusts of wind, to melt away into the blue sky, suddenly
unveiled in dazzling glimpses between the surging clouds. A long flight
of mossy steps ascends to the plateau occupied by the Sanatorium, with
wide verandahs and a poetic garden, like some old Italian pleasaunce,
with fountain and sundial, espaliered orange boughs, and ancient
rose-trees overhanging paved walks, gay parterres, and avenues of
myrtle or heliotrope. Flowers are perennial even on these airy heights,
and dense hedges of datura, with long white bells drooping in myriads
over the pointed foliage, transform each narrow lane into a vista of
enchantment. Eastern Java spreads map-like beneath the overhanging
precipice, the blue strait of Madoera curving between fretted peak and
palm-clad isle. The velvety plum-colour of nearer ranges fades through
tints of violet and mauve into the ethereal lilac of distant summits.
The lowlands gleam with brimming fish-ponds and flooded _sawas_, as
though the sea penetrated through creek and inlet to the heart of the
green country, the vague glitter of this watery world investing the
scene with dream-like unreality. Brown _campongs_ cling to mountain
crest and precipitous ledge. These almost inaccessible fastnesses were
colonised after the Moslem conquest by a Hindu tribe which refused to
relinquish Brahminism. Driven from place to place by the fanatical
hordes of Islam on the downfall of the Hindu empire, the persecuted
race, a notable exception to native inconstancy and indifference,
retreated by degrees to this mountain stronghold, where they
successfully retained their religious independence, and defended
themselves from Mohammedan hostility. Brahminism through centuries of
isolation, has assimilated many extraneous heathen rites, and wild
superstitions have overlaid the original creed. The worship of the
Tenggerese is now mainly directed to the ever-active crater of the
awe-inspiring Bromo, always faced by the longer side of the windowless
communal houses, built to contain the several generations of the
families which in patriarchal fashion inhabit these spacious dwellings.
Huge clouds of smoke from the majestic volcano curl perpetually above
the surrounding peaks, and float slowly westward, the thunderous roar
of the colossal crater echoing in eternal menace through the rarefied
air, and regarded as the voice of the god who inhabits the fiery
Inferno. These lonely hills, ravaged by tempest and haunted by beasts
of prey, are the hiding-places of fear and the cradles of
ever-deepening superstition. Wild fancies sway the untaught
mountaineers, responsive to Nature's wonders, though powerless to
interpret their signification. The constant struggle for existence
produces a character utterly opposed to that of the suave and facile
Malay. The graces of life are unknown, but the strenuous temperament of
the Tenggerese is shown by indefatigable industry in the difficult
agriculture of the mountain region, and the careful cultivation of the
vegetables for which the district is renowned. Day by day, the
Tenggerese women--gaunt, scantily-clad, and almost unsexed by incessant
toil in the teeth of wind and weather--carry down their burdens to the
plain, their backs bent under the weight of the huge crates, while the
brown and wizened children are prematurely aged and deformed by their
share in the family toil. The more prosperous inhabitant carries his
vegetables on a mountain pony, trained to wonderful feats in the art of
sliding up and climbing down walls of rock almost devoid of foothold,
for the riding of Tenggerese youth and maiden rivals that of the Sioux
Indian. Misdirected zeal strips the hills of forest growth; the scanty
pines of the higher zone serving as fuel, and the ruthless destruction
of timber brings the dire result of decreasing rainfall. Only bamboo
remains wherewith to build the communal houses, formerly constructed of
tastefully blended woods, and the flimsy substitute, unfitted to resist
drenching rain and raging wind, is dragged with the utmost difficulty
from cleft and gorge along rude tracks hewn out in the mountain side.
Rice, elsewhere the mainstay of life in Java, has never been cultivated
by the Tenggerese, the sowing and planting of the precious crop being
forbidden to them during the era of gradual retreat before the
Mohammedan army centuries ago, and the innate conservatism of the
secluded tribe, in spite of life's altered environment, clings to the
dead letter of an obsolete law. The tigers, once numerous round Tosari,
have retreated into the jungle clothing the lower hills, and seldom
issue from their forest lairs unless stress of weather drives them
upward for a nightly prowl round byre and pen. The destruction of
covert renders Tosari immune from this past peril, and the tragic tiger
stories related round the hearthstone of the communal house are
becoming oral traditions of a forgotten day, gathering round themselves
the moss and lichen of fable and myth.
The main interest of Tosari centres round the stupendous Bromo,
possessing the largest crater in the world, a fathomless cavity three
miles in diameter, veiled in Stygian darkness, and suggesting the
yawning mouth of hell. This bottomless pit, bubbling like a boiling
cauldron, pouring out black volumes of sulphureous smoke, and
clamouring with unceasing thunder, was for ages a blood-stained altar
of human sacrifice. Every year the fairest maiden of the Tengger was
the chosen victim offered to Siva, who, in his attribute of a Consuming
Fire, occupied the volcanic abyss. The worship of the Divine Destroyer
has ever been a fruitful source of crime and cruelty, and a tangible
atmosphere of evil lingers round those hoary temples of India dedicated
to the Avenging Deity, whose fanatical followers are reckoned by
millions. Through the inversion of creed peculiar to Hindu Pantheism,
the propitiation of Divine wrath has become the fundamental principle
of religion, and pathetic appeals for mercy continually ascend from
darkened hearts to those unseen powers vividly present to Hindu
thought, which, amid countless errors and degradations, has never
ceased to grasp the central fact of Eternity. The impalpable air teems
with Divinity. Watchful eyes and clutching hands surround the pilgrim's
path, and unseen spirits dog faltering footsteps as they stumble
through the snares and pitfalls of earthly life. In the rude tribes of
the Tengger, hereditary faith reflects the uncompromising features of
local environment. The lotus-eating races of the tropical lowlands,
with their feeble grasp on the sterner aspects of creed and character,
have nothing in common with this Indian tribe, remaining on the
outskirts of an alien civilisation. The creed for which the early
Tenggerese fought and conquered, has cooled from white heat to a
shapeless petrifaction, and weird influences throng the ruined temple
of a moribund faith, but the shadows which loom darkly above the
mouldering altars still command the old allegiance, and a thousand
hereditary ties bind heart and soul to the past.
The expedition to the Bromo, by horse or litter, affords the supreme
experience of Javanese volcanoes. The broken track, knee-deep in mud
and rent by landslips, traverses fields of Indian corn, rocky clefts,
and rugged water-courses. The familiar flora of Northern Europe fringes
babbling brooks, their banks enamelled with wild strawberries and
reddening brambles. Curtains of ghostly mist lift at intervals to
disclose the magical pink and blue of the mountain distance, as sunrise
throws a shaft of scarlet over the grim cliff's of the Moengal Pass. A
chasm in the stony wall reveals the famous Sand Sea below the abrupt
precipice, a yellow expanse of arid desert encircling three fantastic
volcanoes. The pyramidal Batok, the cloud-capped Bromo, and the
serrated Widodaren, set in the wild solitude of this desolate Sahara,
form a startling picture, suggesting a sudden revelation of Nature's
mysterious laboratories. The deep roar of subterranean thunder, and the
fleecy clouds of sulphureous smoke ever rising from the vast furnaces
of the Bromo, emphasise the solemnity of the marvellous scene. Native
ideas recognise this terror-haunted landscape as the point where Times
touches Eternity, and natural forces blend with occult influences.
Tjewara Lawang, "the gate of the spirits," traditionally haunted by the
countless _Devas_ of Hindu Pantheism, bounds the ribbed and tumbled
Sand Sea with a black bridge of fretted crags, from whence the
invisible host keeps watch and ward over the regions of eternal fire.
By a fortunate coincidence, the annual festival of the Bromo is
celebrated to-day, when Siva, the Third Person of the Hindu Triad, is
propitiated by a living sacrifice. Goats and buffaloes were flung into
the flaming crater long after the offering of human victims was
discontinued, but, alas for the chicanery of a degenerate age! even the
terrified animals thrown into the air by the sacrificing priest never
reach the mystic under-world, their downward progress being arrested by
a skilled accomplice, who catches them at a lower level, and risks
great Siva's wrath by preserving them for more prosaic uses. The
silence of the Sand Sea is broken to-day by the bustle of a gay market
on the brink of the yellow plain. The terrific descent through a gash
in the precipice, carved by falling boulders, landslips, and torrential
rains, lands the battered pilgrim in the midst of a lively throng in
festal array. Girls in rose and orange _saris_, with silver pins in
sleek dark hair plaited with skeins of scarlet wool, dismount from
rough ponies for refreshment, or gallop across the Sand Sea to the
mountain of sacrifice. The turbaned men in rough garb of indigo and
brown show less zeal than their womenkind, and betel-chewing, smoking,
or the consumption of syrups and sweetmeats, prove more attractive than
the religious service, for modern materialism extends even to these
remote shores, and the Avenging God is often worshipped by proxy.
The Sand Sea was originally the base of the Tengger volcano, split from
head to foot by an appalling eruption, which forced mud, sand, and lava
from the enclosing walls into the surrounding valley. Fresh craters
formed in the vast depths of sand and molten metal; the three new
volcanoes--Bromo, Battok, and Widodaren--casting themselves up from the
blazing crucibles hidden beneath the fire-charged earth. We stand on
the thin and crumbling crust of the globe's most friable surface, a
mere veil concealing fountains of eternal fire, foaming solfataras, and
smoking fumaroles. Circle after circle, the great belt of volcanic
peaks rises around us, visible outlets of incalculable forces, ever
menacing the world with ruin and havoc.
On the steep descent, a few devout pilgrims offer preliminary
sacrifices of food, or flowers, to the _Devas_ of the mountains, laying
the little treasures in oval vaults dug by human hands, before entering
the inner courts of the fiery sanctuary. The yellow Sand Sea, swept by
a moaning wind, sends up whirling eddies, and the dusky haze shimmers
in fantastic outlines, which probably originated the idea of spiritual
presences hovering round the scene. Grey heather and clumps of
cypress-grass dot the wild Sahara with their dry and colourless
monotony, but give place on the southern side to patches of fern and
turf, the scanty pasture of the mountain ponies, herding together until
sickness or accident breaks the ranks, when the hapless sufferer,
deserted by his kind, falls an easy prey to the wild dogs of the
Tengger ranges. A heap of bleaching bones points to some past tragedy,
and terrifies the swerving horses of the native pilgrims. The ascent of
the Bromo is negotiated from the eastern side to the lip of the
gigantic crater. Slanting precipices of lava, their grey flanks scored
with black gullies below the volcanic ash which covers the upper
slopes, rise to the jagged pinnacles bordering the black gulf of
eternal mystery and night. A rickety ladder of bamboo, approached
through a chaos of boulders, mounts to the edge of the profound abyss.
The ladder has been renewed for this Day of Atonement, and worshippers
clad in rainbow hues crowd round the base of the volcano, while the
priests of Siva, in motley robes of brilliant patchwork, adorned with
cabalistic tracery in white, ascend the swaying rungs, bearing their
struggling victims, bleating, crowing, and clucking in mortal terror.
Stalwart arms toss the black goat with accurate aim to an assistant
priest, who passes on his clever "catch" to a third expert in the task
of hoodwinking Siva and depriving him of his lawful prey. Sundry cocks
and hens, evidently toothsome morsels, are then thrown from one priest
to another, and saved for the cooking-pot, but a tough-looking
chanticleer of the Cochin China persuasion is finally selected, and
cast into the seething pit to propitiate the terrible wrath of the
Avenging Deity at the smallest expense and loss to the astute
priesthood. At the close of the sacerdotal is sacreligious performance,
we mount the shaking ladder to a thatched shed on the rim of the
crater. From hence, between the dense volumes of smoke, the huge cavity
is visible to a depth of 600 feet. Sallow clouds of sulphur emerge from
a pandemonium of tumultuous clamour; red-hot stones shoot upward, but
fall back into the chasm before they reach us; burning ashes strike the
smooth walls with a weird scream, and then whirl back into the
darkness; yellow solfataras rise in foaming jets, with the fierce hiss
of unseen serpents, and bellowing thunders shake the earth. The superb
spectacle of nature's power in her armoury of terror is unique among
the volcanos of Java, for unless the Bromo blazes in the throes of a
violent eruption, when the ascent to the crater becomes impossible, no
danger exists in gazing down into the mysterious abyss. At every gust
which rages round this laboratory of Nature, the vast clouds--black,
yellow, and blue--floating away into space, assume grotesque forms
suggesting primeval monsters or menacing giants, darkening the skies
with their ghostly presence. Driving rain and a rising gale hasten a
rapid descent to the Sand Sea, but the sudden storm dies away into
sunlit mists. The climb to the Moenggal Pass is complicated by a series
of pools and cascades; the horses pick their own perilous way, but the
management of the chairs by the noisy coolies demands superhuman
strength and security of hand and foot, the crazy and battered _doolie_
escaping falls and collisions by a continuous miracle.
The expedition to Ngandwona, in the heart of the hills, skirts green
precipices and traverses brown _campongs_ forlorn and neglected, like
this stranded Hindu race, incapable of adjustment to life's law of
change, and retaining the form without the spirit of the past. The
glens lie veiled in cloud, but the peaks bask in sunshine. Waterfalls
dash through thickets of crimson foxglove, and daturas swing their
fragrant bells over the dancing water. A little goatherd, leading his
bleating flock, plays on a reed flute to summon a straggler from a
distant crag. The brown figure, in linen waistcloth and yellow turban,
suggests that Indian personality which has survived ages of exile on
these lonely heights. The route to Ngandwona discloses the Tengger in
a different aspect; the volcanos are far away, and this central region
is rich in pastoral pictures full of lulling charm. The voice of the
Bromo still breaks the silence of the deep valley with a mysterious
undertone, but only benignant _Devas_ haunt this flower-filled hollow,
remote alike from the terrors of Nature and the influences of the
external world.
The following day varies the character of the range, exposed to every
vicissitude of temperature and climate. White billows of fog beat upon
the mountain tops like a silent sea, and blot out the landscape with an
impenetrable veil. Thunder echoes through the rocky caves with
incessant reverberations, and rain settles down in a drenching flood.
The chill of the wooden Hotel penetrates to the bone; enthusiasm wanes
below zero, and even scorching Sourabaya appears preferable to this wet
and windy refuge on the storm-swept heights. The hurricane proves brief
in proportion to the violence displayed, and the walk to Poespo at
dawn, behind the baggage-coolie, is a vision of delight. Violet
mountains lean against the pale blue of a rain-washed sky, tjewara and
teak glisten with jewelled lustre, and the Tengger, bathed in
amethystine light, lifts itself above the world as the realm of purity
and peace, ever revealed and prophesied by the glory of mountain
scenery.