“Yes, gentlemen, from our expert at the scientific opium-smoke. Now, as his letter contains very few, if any, secrets, and that moreover it is addressed to us in general, I need not follow our host’s example; and I will read it to you in full.”
“But, my dear fellow,” said Grenits, “it is getting late, nearly nine o’clock. Is there anything in that letter about butterflies?”
“Oh, yes.”
“And about beetles and snakes?”
“Oh yes, certainly.”
“Then, I say! heaven help us, those entomologists are so long-winded; they don’t spare you a single claw, not an antenna, not a shard!”
“Oh, you won’t find it so bad as all that,” laughed van Rheijn; “just listen.”
“ ‘My dear friend, in your last letter you ask me how I pass the time at Gombong. At first, I must confess, it was tedious work and everything looked very black. You know, I was rather smitten with Agatha van Bemmelen, and I have reason to flatter myself that she used not to shut her little peepers very hard when she happened to meet me at Santjoemeh. So, when I first came here, my thoughts ran entirely on her; I detested my new place, and cursed the man who had played me the scurvy trick of having me transferred. Of entomology there was no question. Two or three times I went out and tried to get some specimens, but I failed woefully. Wherever I went, in whatever direction I took my walks, there was but one picture before my eyes—the image of my Agatha’s sparkling eyes and my Agatha’s rosy cheeks.
“ ‘So utterly lost was I in rapture that the rarest specimens in butterflies fluttered past my very nose without my so much as holding out my net. I gave the whole thing up in despair, and tossed all my apparatus into a corner. But, what to do with oneself at Gombong? The officers of the garrison were busy enough; but I had nothing—absolutely nothing—to occupy my time. The climate of Gombong is a wretched one—most miserably healthy, no chance of ever getting a patient here! Being a devout Catholic, I sent up a little prayer every now and then for a good epidemic, or at least some case worthy of keeping one’s interest going—nothing of the kind!’ ”
“Well now,” cried Theodoor, “did you ever hear of such a fellow, praying for an epidemic! Such a chap as that ought to be put out of the colony altogether—he is fit only for the new lunatic asylum at Buitenzorg!”