How shall we greet each other when we meet at last? I know exactly what you will say to me at first: "But child how stout you have grown!"
And I shall whisper between two hugs, "I have grown old, both outwardly and inwardly, but that little spot in my heart where love is written in golden letters remains the same, for ever young."
[1] To Mevrouw Ovink-Soer.
XIV
9th January, 1901.[1]
New conditions will come into the Javanese world, if not through us, through others who will come after us. Emancipation is in the air; it has been foreordained. And she whose destiny it is to be the spiritual mother of the new age must suffer. It is the eternal law of nature: those who bear, must feel the pain of bearing; but the child has all our love, though its very existence, above that of all others living, has harassed us. Though it has been received through suffering, it is eternally precious to us.
Nothing is more miserable than to feel the power to work within one, and yet to be condemned to idleness. Thank God, this curse has been taken from me.
A short while ago, a professor from Jena, Dr. Anton, with his wife, was here with us; he was travelling in pursuance of his studies. They came here to make our acquaintance.