_1st of August, 1901._[1]
We Javanese cannot live without flowers and sweet odours. The native
flowers in their splendour awaken in me a world of thought and feeling
whenever I breathe in their perfume. Days afterwards it lives in my
memory, and I feel the strong Javanese blood coursing through my veins.
Oh soul of my people, that used to be too beautiful, that was full of
kindness, poetry, gentleness and modesty--what has become of you? What
have time and slothfulness not made of you?
It is so often said that we are more European than Javanese in our
hearts. Sad thought! We know that we are impregnated with European ideas
and feelings--but the blood, the Javanese blood that flows live and warm
through our veins, can never die. We feel it in the smell of incense and
in the perfume of flowers, in the tones of the gamelan, in the sighing
of the wind through the tops of the cocoa-nut trees, the cooing of the
turtle doves, the whistling of the fields of ripened rice, in the
pounding of the haddi-blokken[2] at the time of the rice harvest.
Not for nothing have we passed our whole lives amid surroundings where
everything depends upon form; we have learned the emptiness of those
forms, their lack of meaning and of substance; there is much good in the
Javanese people. We are so anxious for you to admire our people. When I
see something fine, some trait of character, that is peculiarly
Javanese, then I think "How glad I should be if Mevrouw A. were with us.
She would be pleased at this thing, would appreciate it, she who has
wide open eyes for everything that is noble."
Our little Javanese woodcarver-artist as you call him, has made
something very beautiful with the whole wajanghistory[3] carved upon it.
Wajang figures on the cover, on the outside and inside both, and on all
four walls. There is a case designed to protect it, which is also
ornamented with wajang figures. The box is lined with orange satin,
which is gathered and pleated, and it is set off by a silver rim, also
of native workmanship. Indeed it ought to be very beautiful, for it is
designed to hold the portraits of the Regents of Java and Madeira, which
the queen has ordered sent to her. This mark of homage is a pretty idea.
The Regent of Garoat ordered the box and I was given free play. I might
spend as much as I liked for both objects.
[1] To Mevrouw Abendanon.
[2] In Java the rice is beaten from the husks by great wooden mortars.
The pounding noise made by these on the sawahs (rice fields) at the time
of the harvest produces a monotonous cadence.
[3] Wajang is the Javanese drama, it is very ancient and in the 9th
century was already a traditional institution in its present form. It
presents always the romantic legends or sagas of the Island, though some
of the stories are versions of those in Hindu mythology and were
introduced after the Hindu occupation of Java. There are three principal
forms of wajang, the most common is the wajang kĕlitik or little
wajangs, puppets made of leather. The master of the show or delang
manipulates the strings and recites the lines behind the scenes.
Sometimes the performances last from 7.30 in the evening until 6 in the
morning. The wajang topeng or lyric drama existed in the year 1000 and
probably earlier. The performers are men and women wearing grotesque
masks. Animal masks such as tigers, elephants, wild boars, birds, etc.,
are often worn. In the presence of royalty the actors play unmasked.
The wajang beber is of very early origin and is a shadow play, shadows
of marionettes being shown through a white cloth.
At the time of the Mohammedan conquest in the 15th century and after the
forcible conversion of the Javanese to Mohammedanism, an effort was made
to change the wajangs to conform with the Mohammedan law which forbade
the representation of human beings, hence the introduction of the
grotesque contorted masks still in use.
Wajang performances are always accompanied by gamelan music, explanatory
verse and a chorus with chants.