Across the Equator Part 6

Boro-Boedoer op het Eiland Java; 1873, by F. C. Wilsen, 2 vols.

In addition to a selection from the above-named, the intending visitor should read "Java: The Garden of the East" by Miss E. R. Scidmore, 1898, and the Rev. G. M. Reith's "A Padre in Partibus" will be found entertaining.

Much must depend upon the notions of the tourist as to the cost of a trip in Java, but our experience is that Java is the cheapest country we have ever visited. The hotels are superior to those found in the interior of j.a.pan, and, as the guilder, which has a value of 70 cents in Singapore currency or about 1s. 7d. in English currency, may be taken as the unit of value for travelling purposes, our readers will see at a glance what a fortnight or three weeks' trip is likely to cost from the following hotel rates:--

Hotel des Indes, Batavia 6 guilders per day

Hotel Bellevue, Buitenzorg 6 " "

Hotel, Sindanglaya 6 " "

Hotel Garoet 6 " "

Gov't. Hotel, Maos 4 " "

Hotel Mataram, Djocjakarta 5 " "

Hotel Simpang, Sourabaya 6 " "

Sanitorium, Tosari 7 " "

Hotel du Pavilion, Samarang 5 " "

There are a few extras, and the servants are civilised enough to expect small tips. Charges for liquors are invariably reasonable.

The hotels are scrupulously clean and the accommodation excellent, and in a tropical country one appreciates the facilities for bathing.

In his delightful poem of "Lucile," Owen Meredith wrote:--

We may live without poetry, music and art; We may live without conscience, and live without heart; We may live without friends; we may live without books; But civilised man cannot live without cooks.

He may live without books,--what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope,--what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love,--what is pa.s.sion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

Here the poet leaves the realms of poetic fantasy to record a simple fact of everyday life--one which is appreciated by every man and woman irrespective of nationality or temperament. As in all other matters pertaining to the comfort of the European in the tropics, the Dutch, in the matter of food, seem to us to have achieved better results than we have in the British Colonies. The "riz-tafel" may not appeal to the English palate, but there is no lack of clean, wholesome dishes, and side dishes that make us wonder at the toleration of the traveller with the Indian and Colonial caravanserai. The tourist who visits Java after traversing India will be agreeably surprised at the difference in favour of the Dutch Colony in this respect.

In the matter of the personal attention to their guests by the management of some of Hotels in the interior, and the supply of information, there could easily be an improvement, and doubtless there will be a great change when tourist traffic becomes more general, as it promises to do in the near future. Our own experience was that we were left, almost invariably, to the tender mercies of the servants, and as one's Malay was limited this led to avoidable inconvenience.

Nothing, however, could exceed the courtesy and attention of the management at the Hotel des Indes, in Batavia, and the Hotel du Pavilion in Samarang, and the Manager of the Hotel at Sindanglaya.

We have already mentioned Stamm and Weijns Restaurant in Batavia.

Coupled with it for excellence of table is Grimm's famous restaurant in Sourabaya.

This year, thanks to the efforts of some of the leading hotel proprietors, the government of Netherlands India has awakened to the possibilities of Java as a country for tourists. Co-operating with the Hotels and steam-s.h.i.+p companies, special inducements were held out to visitors during the months of May and June, in the way of reduced fares, and the success of the venture will doubtless lead to its continuance.

The Koninklyke Paketvaart Maatschappij (s.h.i.+p's Agency, late J. Daendels and Co.) issues tickets at single-fare rates to Batavia and Sourabaya, the fare to Batavia and back being $45; to Sourabaya and back $63; and to Batavia and along the Coast Ports to Sourabaya and back to Singapore (sixteen days on board s.h.i.+p) $74. The tickets are available by the steamers of the Royal Nederland Line and the Rotterdamsche Lloyd.

Travel by rail throughout the Island is cheap. For the convenience of visitors with limited time to devote to Java, a tourist ticket has been arranged. This may be obtained from the Steams.h.i.+p Company in Singapore.

The price is $40 (Singapore currency). The tour laid down by the coupons covers the whole of Java from Tanjong Priok, the port of Batavia, to the easternmost end of the island beyond Sourabaya on the way to Tosari and Bromo. Buitenzorg and the Preanger health resorts may be visited on the tickets, the famous Hindu ruins near Djocjakarta, and the health resorts of Eastern Java. The journey may be broken wherever the tourist cares to stay, and the ticket is available for sixty days.

Directions are printed on the ticket in English in regard to baggage and other matters, and a small outline map is a useful adjunct.

Throughout the island, the carriages for hire are execrable. The four-pony victoria which took us from Djocjakarta to the Buddhist ruins at Parambanan had not gone half a mile when one of the wheels came off, and we were lucky to escape without serious damage. It will always remain a marvel to us how the ramshackle kreta held together which took us from Buitenzorg to Sindanglaya, over the Poentjak Pa.s.s, and we are astonished that the Dutch authorities, who are exacting in other respects, do not exercise a wholesome supervision over the ponies employed in these cross-country carts and carriages, for a more wretched collection of horseflesh could scarcely be imagined.

We have already commented on the Toelatings Kaart. This relic of a past age, which did not add much to the revenue, and impressed one unfavourably with a rigid officialism at the port of entry that did not obtrude itself upon one's notice in the interior, may now be avoided by the traveller registering at the Tourist Bureau. In our own case, we were never called upon to produce the kaart.

The general impression left by one's visit to Java is the excessive cleanliness of town and country and the widespread cultivation. There are, of course, black spots in the towns; but they are as nothing to the traveller who has perambulated the native quarters of any British Colony in the Far East. When we think of the millions of dollars Hongkong has expended to cope with filth-created plagues and to reduce the native rookeries of China town, it fills us with the highest admiration for Dutch administration in Java. The Government of the Straits Settlements is entering upon a similar campaign to rectify past sins against the laws of sanitation and hygiene, and hundreds of thousands of dollars might have been available for other purposes had the Chinese been handled as the Dutch handle them in Batavia, Samarang and Sourabaya. It may be overdoing the cult for whitewash to whiten the walls of every bridge and the stack of every sugar mill in the country, but it is pleasing to the Europeans to see that one nation has been successful in carrying its ideas of cleanliness into the tropics and in making the Oriental conform to the ordinary laws for the protection of the health of the common people.

To those of our readers who may be induced to visit Java, we would tender a few words of advice.

If it is intended to compress a tour of the princ.i.p.al places we have noted into a fortnight's holiday, travel, if possible, to Sourabaya, and go first of all to Tosari. After a few days there, Djocjakarta should be made the headquarters for a two or three days' inspection of the Buddhist ruins, and then Bandoeng could be made a halting place while a decision is arrived at as to whether Sindanglaya, Soekaboemi or Garoet is to be visited next before going on to Buitenzorg and Batavia. We recommend this course because there is a more frequent service of steamers between Batavia and Singapore, and by ascertaining the sailing dates while at some of the Preanger health resorts one is able to time one's arrival at Batavia and so avoid the heat of the seaport.

We have painted Java in rosy colours because we found it beautiful, the people companionable and the conditions agreeable. It is possible that others may go over our tracks without deriving a t.i.the of the enjoyment.

No one should travel unless he has a genius for travel and a ready adaptability to prevailing conditions. He should bear in mind that it is he who is the odd piece in the machinery, and that unless he adjusts himself to the other working pieces he will only have himself to blame if things do not run smoothly. If Java is visited in the right spirit, we have not the least doubt that the traveller will be delighted with all he sees and experiences, and will come away with an a.s.sured conviction that it was no exaggeration which styled the island "The Garden of the East."

[Map: JAVA.]