Mieux nourri, mieux logé, j’en ferais bonne chère.
Il faut vivre avant tout, soit vie de misère.
Le crime fait la honte, et non la pauvreté.’
But when, afterwards, I went to the publishers of the ‘Copyist,’ to give them my twenty guilders, I was told that I owed nothing. It appears that the General had himself paid the money for me, to prevent this illustrated receipt being sent back to Batavia. But——what did he do, after the taking away of that turkey—?
“It was a theft; and after that epigram?”
“He punished me terribly. If he had accused me as being guilty of want of respect for the Governor of Western Sumatra, which could have been explained in those days with a little ingenuity, as an endeavour to undermine, to revolt, ‘or as theft on the public road,’ he would have showed himself to be a right-minded man. But no, he punished me better! He ordered the man who had to watch the turkeys to choose henceforth another road; and as to my epigram … that is still worse—he said nothing, and did nothing. You see that was cruel! He did not grant me the smallest claim to be a martyr … I did not become interesting by persecution, and was not allowed to be unhappy through excess of wit … it was enough to disgust me once for all with epigrams and turkeys. So little encouragement extinguishes the flame of genius to the last spark! I never did it again!” [[217]]
[1] Three Dutch settlements on the west coast of North Sumatra. Singkel is the most northern of the Dutch possessions in that island, and is separated by a river of the same name from the still independent little states of Troomon and Analaboo. Still further north commences the Sultanat of Atchin. The whole coast from Ayer-Bangie to the northern point is known to sailors by name of Pepper Coast. [↑]
[2] Such a fore-gallery is open on three sides and supported by pillars. The reader will find a description of an Indian house infra, p. 231. [↑]
[3] Eigen Haard veel Waard = “One’s own hearth is worth much.” (There’s no place like home.) The lady’s name was Everdine Huberte van Wijnbergen. [↑]