Singapore was crowded with Americans fighting for accommodations on the China and Japan steamers; other Americans fighting to get reservations on the Java steamers; still other Americans who, in despair, were going to Hongkong by way of Borneo and the Philippines. They were willing to go first, second or third class—any way at all to get on a ship.
At Raffles' Hotel
The Singapore hotels were crowded and we got the last room in the Raffles Hotel. The great and stately veranda, which serves the double purpose of a bar and an out-of-door reception-room, was usually crowded. That veranda is the redeeming feature of Raffles Hotel. In other respects this great hotel, situated at the cross-roads where East and West and North and South meet, is not up to what a good hotel should be.
We got the last state-room on a steamer to Java, and to our great surprise we found the ship to be the nicest we had traveled on, and the cooking to rival that of the great restaurants of Paris.
Cholera was rampant in certain parts of Java, but that didn't stop the sightseers. Nothing less than an earthquake or a lost letter of credit could have stopped them.
Our adventures in Java were a repetition of "crowds." The Hotel des Indes in Batavia was crowded and we got the last room. The railways were crowded, but not so much as the ones in India, and the carriages are most comfortable.
For a week we did volcanoes and gorgeous scenery, and realized what a delightful place Java is. It is even nicer than Japan, and the hotels are the best in the East.
My chief purpose in going to Java was to get a Javanese waterwheel. They had one at the world's fair in Chicago, and I have remembered it ever since as one of the most musical things I have ever heard. A friend of mine wanted me to get him one and I volunteered to do so. I supposed that we would hear waterwheels just as soon as we got off the ship. But I was evidently mistaken.
Nobody in Java, so far as I could discover, had ever seen or heard of a Javanese waterwheel. I inquired of dozens of people—people who had lived there all their lives—but they looked blank when I spoke of waterwheels. I drew pictures of it, but that didn't enlighten them.