We passed a comfortable night in Maos at the Government rest house, Staats, and left at the early hour of 6 a.m. for a return journey to Batavia. We found that when we reached a junction, our train diverged over a new route, giving us a different outlook, not unlike our first experience, but, it seemed, with finer mountain scenery. First we climbed to an altitude of about twenty-two hundred feet; then gradually descended, our objective point, Batavia, being at sea-level. Many of the high mountains showed cultivation to the very top, while the plains with their alternate groups of bamboo, cocoanut, and other palms, were green with the new rice crop, the cultivation of this commodity being different in Java from that in Burma. Great care is expended on the culture of the rice, the tiny plants first being put in small wet enclosures; then, when sufficiently developed, they are planted separately by the small army of workers, in receptacles made for them, and set with the greatest regularity. The workers consist usually of women or young girls, and the varied colors of their dress—or undress—presented a marked feature. We also saw more coffee cultivated than on any previous route, and it is to be regretted that the blight of ten years ago has taken this old form of industry from the Javanese. Strange as it may seem, we had no Java coffee in Java, the land of the celebrated brand; nor did we see anything but a very strong extract of coffee (to which was added a large quantity of milk), good and convenient, no doubt, but not at all like the real article.
We arrived in Batavia during the afternoon; the hotel wore a homelike air, and we passed a restful twenty-four hours with only a drive as the regular programme. I have already treated of the marked natural advantages of Java, and of the temples; too much cannot be said of this "Garden of the East," with its varied landscape of alternating mountains and plains, its wealth of trees in myriad forms, its shrubs which in their luxuriance seem tree-like, and its tangle of vines and blossoming flowers. But it appeared to me as if this holiday side of nature and the workaday aspect of the life in Java did not harmonize, and I wondered if this condition was caused by Dutch thrift being grafted on to the native Javanese temperament, which in its incipiency was simple and disinclined to much exertion. Certain it is that the women of Java, while apparently contented, look careworn and have deep lines in their faces, and the perfect cultivation of the soil,[5] which is largely done by women, shows that constant toil must be required of them. Added to this is the care of a bevy of little ones—more infants to the square yard than I had ever seen before.
These true children of Nature are seemingly trusting and believing, and they ask no better fate than they have. The question obtrudes itself, Would life have been easier if the English had not again ceded Java to Holland in 1816, after only a five years' tenure? This query regarding the Orient in general also comes up: Is it better to leave the peoples undisturbed in their ignorance of the broader life and higher conditions, or to try to teach them ways foreign to their nature,—efforts which might end in failure? This is the problem that confronts the philanthropist at every turn, and were it not for the possibility of alleviating the condition of womanhood, it might be well to abandon all charitable effort. Scientists believe, nevertheless, that while it will be a slow, laborious process, much can be done in time; it behooves us who have our homes in a country where it is a pleasure to live not to turn a deaf ear to appeals like that made by Ramabai, who at Pina, near Bombay, is laboring to uplift the condition of child widows in India. The great volume of missionary effort is also turned in the same direction, and through schools and hospitals the social workers are paving the way toward better conditions, in spite of the criticism of some who derisively speak of the failure to "save souls," without thinking that the first step is to emancipate the body.
When I regard the condition of the women of the Orient, I feel like starting an immediate crusade—in Egypt they are slaves or toys; in India, bound by the iron laws of custom and caste, sad and dejected; in Burma, happy because independent on business and property lines, thanks to the English Government; in Ceylon, cheerful but with no recognized positions; in Java, children of toil; in Siam, fearless and intrepid in temperament, but subject to the conditions of the Orient; in China, Manchuria, and Korea, seemingly impassive but bound by traditional customs, enforced for centuries; in Japan, bright and winsome, true children of Nature, still held by the customs of years, however much the barriers are being broken down by the progressive policy of the country.
