Translation:Max Havelaar/19

by Multatuli

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Prologue - Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7 - Chapter 8 - Chapter 9 - Chapter 10 - Chapter 11 - Chapter 12 - Chapter 13 - Chapter 14 - Chapter 15 - Chapter 16 - Chapter 17 - Chapter 18 - Chapter 19 - Chapter 20 - Chapter 21 - Chapter 22 - Chapter 23 - Chapter 24 - Chapter 25 - Chapter 26 - Chapter 27 - Chapter 28 - Chapter 29 - Chapter 30 - Chapter 31 - Chapter 32 - Chapter 33 - Chapter 34 - Chapter 35 - Chapter 36 - Chapter 37 - Chapter 38 - Chapter 39

Havelaar seemed to understand what Tine meant, for he said:

"Good, child! But do you know, gentlemen, that one is often misled in judging the claims some people have for material incompleteness?"

I am sure that the guests had never heard of those claims.

"On Sumatra I knew a girl," he continued, "the daughter of a datoe. Well, I think she had no right to be incomplete. And yet I saw her fall in the water during a shipwreck, and someone else too. I, a man, needed to help her to come ashore."

"But, should she have flown like a gull?"

"Of course, or no, she should not have had a body. Do you want to know how I met her? It was in '42. I was a Controller in Natal. Have you been there, Verbrugge?"

"Yes."

"Well, you know that there is a pepper cultivation in Natal. The pepper gardens are in Taloh-Baleh, North of Natal, on the shore. I had to inspect them, and because I knew nothing of pepper, I took in the prahoe a datoe, who knew more about it. His daughter, a thirteen-year-old child, went along. We sailed along the coast and were a bit bored."

"And then came the shipwreck?"

"Oh no, it was fine weather, too fine. That shipwreck was much later. In that case I would not have been bored. Well, we sailed along the coast and it was very hot. Such a prahoe offers little diversion and I was in a sad mood, which had many causes. First, I was an unsuccessful lover – that was my daily bread in that time – but I also was in a stage between two attacks of ambition. I had made myself King and had been dethroned. I had climbed a tower and had fallen down. Well, I'll skip that story. Enough, I was in that prahoe with a long face and a bad mood - as the Germans say, I was ungenießbar. I felt that it was wrong to have me inspect the pepper gardens and that I deserved to be appointed Governor of the solar system. It also seemed like immoral murder to put me in one prahoe with that silent datoe and his child.

I must say that in general I did like the Malay chiefs, and we got along well. They have much that causes me to esteem them higher than the Javanese chiefs. Yes, I know, Verbrugge, that you disagree, there will be few who will agree, but we'll leave that for now.

If I had made that trip on a different day, I mean with fewer worries in my head, I would have started a chat with that datoe and perhaps I would have found that his company was not so bad at all. Perhaps I might also have got the girl to speak, and this might have entertained me, for there is a lot of originality in a child. However, I must admit that I still was a child myself, too much so to be interested in originality. Today this is different, today I see each thirteen-year-old girl as a manuscript in which almost nothing has been changed yet. The author is surprised en negligé, and that's often nice.

The child threaded beads on a cord, which required all her attention. Three red beads, one black bead, three red, one black: it was beautiful.

Her name was Si Oepi Keteh. On Sumatra this means as much as little lady. Yes, Verbrugge, you know that, but Duclari has always been on Java, Her name was Si Oepi Keteh, but in my mind I called her stupid, because I felt I was very much exalted above her.

The afternoon came, the evening, and the beads were put away. The land shifted along and the ophir to the right became smaller and smaller. To the left in the West was the wide, wide sea, nothing until you reach Madagascar, and Africa beyond. The sun sunk, her rays played ducks-and-drakes over the waves, and she searched refreshment in the sea. Good heavens, what was that thing again?

What thing? The sun?

Why no. I made poems in those days. Oh, wonderful! Listen:

You wonder why the ocean

Which brushes Natal's brown loam

While elsewhere a soft caress

Is ever in distress

And churned to seething foal?

You ask and the fisherboy

Grasps not your request

Or sweeps an arc with his dark eye

Past measureless wastes that lie

Out to the far, far West

He turns the gaze of his dark eye

To West you see him stare

To show you as you look around

Only water, never ground

The ocean, everywhere!

And that is why the ocean

Is rough on Natal's wide strand

Just ocean, ocean all around

And nought but water to be found

'Til Madagascar land!

And many offerings were made

To soothe the ocean's moan

And many cries and many tears

Never heard by mortal ears

Understood by God alone!

And many have have reached their last

Reaching upward to the sky

Searching, thrashing in the air

Seeking help that is not there

To sink and on the seabed lie

…And I don't know how it continued... "

"You could find it by writing to Krijgsman, your secretary in Natal. He has it," said Verbrugge.

"How would he get it?" asked Max.

"Perhaps from your waste basket. But I am sure that he has it. Isn't there the legend of the first sin that made the island sink to protect the anchor place of Natal? The history of Djiwa with the two brothers?"

"Yes, that's true. That legend was not a legend. It was a parable I wrote and it may become a legend in a few centuries, when Krijgsman repeats it a bit too often. Thus began all mythologies. Djiwa is soul, as you know."

"Max, where is the little lady with the beads?" asked Tine.

"The beads were put away. It was six o'clock, and there, near the equator – Natal is a few minutes North: if I were to cross the shore to Ayer-Bangie, I would step on horseback over the equator – or I would trip over it – was six o'clock the signal for evening thoughts. I find that a man always feels a bit better at dusk, ot that he is not as playful as at dawn, and that's natural. In the morning one holds himself together – I know that this is a Germanism, but I don't know how to say it in Dutch – one is a bailiff or a Controller or … no, this is enough! A bailiff holds himself together to do his duty that day – God, what a duty! What does a heart look like when it has been held together! A Controller – I do not mean you, Verbrugge! – a Controller rubs his eyes and is reluctant to meet the new Assistant-Resident who thinks he is superior because he has been a bit longer in service and about whom he has heard so many strange things – on Sumatra. Or he must measure fields that day and doubts between his honesty – you don't know that, Duclari, since you are a soldier, but honest controllers do exist - and he stumbles between that honesty and the fear that Radhen Dhemang will want the white horse back, which counts for much. Or, that day he must clearly reply yes or no to missive number umpteen. In short, in the morning when you wake the world falls on your heart and that's pretty heavy for a heart, even if it is strong. But at dusk there is a break. There are ten full moments from now till the moment he sees his clothing again. Ten hours, 36,000 seconds to be human! Everyone likes that. It is the moment that I hope to die, to arrive on the other side with a relaxed face. This is the moment that your wife finds something in your face, of what caught her when she let you keep the handkerchief with the crowned E in the corner..."

"When she had not yet the right to catch cold," said Tine.

"Now, don't interrupt me. I only want to say that people are gemütlicher at dawn.

While the sun slowly disappeared," Havelaar continued, "I became a better man. The first evidence of this was clear when I said to the little lady:

"It will soon be a bit cooler."

"Yes, toewan!", she replied.

But I humbled my greatness even further for that "stupid" girl, and started a chat. I said a lot because she replied little. I was right in everything I said, and that's getting boring, even if one is very conceited.

"Would you like to join me again, next time, when we go to Taloh-Baleh?" I asked.

"As toewan commander desires."

"No, I ask whether you'd like such a journey."

"If my father wants it," she replied.

Say friends, isn't that enough to drive a man crazy? Well, I did not become crazy. The sun had set, and I felt sufficiently gemütlich that I was not frightened by so much stupidity. Or rather, I believe I began to enjoy hearing my voice – there are few among us who do not like to listen to themselves – but after my silence all day, I thought that, while I was speaking at last, I deserved something better than those silly answers of Si Oepi Keteh.

I'll tell her a story, I thought, so I can hear myself and there is no need that she replies. Well, you know that when a ship is unloaded, the kranjang of sugar that's loaded last will appear first and we also unload a story first when it has been received recently. In the Tijdschrift van Nederlandsch Indie I had recently read a story by Jeronimus: the Japanese quarry worker...

Listen, that Jeronimus wrote nice things. Did you read his Sale in a house of mourning? And his Graves? And in particular the Pedatti? I'll give it to you.

Well, I had recently read the Japanese quarry worker. Oh, I suddenly remember I was lost in that song, in which the dark eye of the fisherboy wanders around in one direction – very strange! It was a sequence of ideas. My feelings that day were related to the danger of the anchorage of Natal – you know, Verbrugge, that no man of war can approach that anchorage, in particular not in July - yes, Duclari, the West monsoon is very strong in July, while here it's the contrary. Well, the danger of that anchorage was linked to my offended ambition, and that ambition is related to the song about Djiwa. I had frequently suggested to the Resident that a sea wall be constructed in Natal, or a harbour in the mouth of the river, to bring merchandise to the department of Natal, which connects the important Battahlands to the sea. One and a half million people in the country could not sell their products because the anchorage of Natal had such a bad reputation. Well, my suggestions were rejected by the Resident, or he said that the government would reject them, and you know that a decent Resident never suggests something if he can predict in advance that the government won't like it. Constructing a harbour in Natal was contrary to the system of enclosure, and far of luring ships towards that place – except in case of force majeure – to allow square-riggers on the anchorage. And whenever a ship came – usually American whalers or French ships that had loaded pepper in the independent empires in the North corner – I always asked the captain to write a letter in which he asked permission to load drinking water. The disturbance over the failure of my attempts to do something to the advantage of Natal, or perhaps the offended vanity – wasn't it terrible to be of such a minor importance that I was unable even to make a harbour where I wanted? Well, all this, including my election to govern the solar system, had made me feel unpleasant that day. When the setting sun healed me a bit – for dissatisfaction is a disease – it was just that disease that made me think of the Japanese quarry worker, and perhaps that's why I thought aloud of the story, pretending that I did it to amuse the child, and secretly taking the last drop of a medicine which I felt needed. But she, the child, healed me – for a day or so – better than my story, which was approximately like this:

Oepi, there was a man who hewed stones from a rock. His labour was difficult, he worked much, but his wages were small, and he was not satisfied.

He sighed because his labour was difficult. And he called: Oh, let me be rich, so that I can rest on a baleh-baleh with a klamboe of red silk.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: it shall be as thou hast said.

And he was rich. He rested on a baleh-baleh and the klamboe was made of red silk.

And the king of the country passed by, in his carriage, announced by riders. And he was also followed by riders, and a gold pajong was held above his head.

And when the rich man saw this, he was sad that there was no gold pajong over his head. And he was not satisfied.

He sighed and said: I wish to be a king.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: it shall be as thou hast said.

And he was a king! There were riders before his carriage and riders after his carriage, and the gold pajong was held above his head.

And the sun shone with hot beams, it burned the earth, making the grass wither.

And the king complained that the sun burned him in the face and had power above him. And he was not satisfied.

He sighed and called: I wish to be the sun.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: it shall be as thou hast said.

And he was the sun. He sent his beams up and down, to the right and to the left, all around.

And he made the grass on the earth wither, and the faces of the princes on the earth as well.

And a cloud positioned itself between the earth and him, which blocked the rays of the sun.

And he became angry that his power was opposed. He complained that the cloud had power over him. And he was not satisfied.

He wanted to be the cloud, which was so powerful.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: it shall be as thou hast said.

And he became a cloud. He positioned himself between sun and earth, and blocked the sunbeams so that the grass grew green.

And the cloud rained big drops over the earth, made the rivers swell, and herds were driven away by banjirs.

And he destroyed the fields with all that water.

And he fell down on a rock, which would not move. He splashed down big streams, but the rock remained where it was.

And he became angry because the rock would not move and the strength of his streams was in vain. And he wasn't satisfied.

He called: to that rock hath been given power above me. I wish to be that rock.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: thou shalt be as thou hast said.

and he became rock. He did not move when the sun shone, and not when it rained.

And there was a man with a pickaxe, a pointed chisel and a heavy hammer, who hewed stones from the rock. And the rock said: what is this, that that man hath more power than I, hewing stones from my womb? And he was not satisfied.

He called: I am weaker than he, I wish to be that man.

And an angel came from heaven, who said: it shall be as thou hast said.

And he was a quarry worker. He hewed stones from the rock. It was difficult labour, he worked hard and earned little wages, and he was satisfied."^[1]

"Really nice," said Duclari, "but you still owe us the proof that the little Oepi was inscrutable."

"No, I did not promise that. I only wanted to tell how I met her. When my story was finished, I asked:

"And you, Oepi, what would you choose if an angel came down from heaven, asking what you wanted?"

"Sir, I'd pray him to take me to heaven."

"Isn't that cute?" Tine asked her visitors, who may have found it funny.

Havelaar stood up, wiping his forehead.^[2]

Footnotes

1. The original story by Jeronimus is longer and less poetic, and the final moral is missing.
2. History tells that, after this voyage, Douwes Dekker invited the girl to live with him. Douwes Dekker's second wife (with whom he married when Tine had died) said that she was actually his third wife, because Oepi was the first.