The cottage or hut of the peasant, called úmah limásan, may be estimated to cost, in its first construction, from two to four rupees, or from five to ten shillings English money. It is invariably built on the ground, as on continental India, and in this respect differs from similar structures in the surrounding islands. The sleeping places, however, are generally a little elevated above the level of the floor, and accord in simplicity with the other parts of the dwelling. The sides or walls are generally formed of bámbus, flattened and plaited together: partitions, if any, are constructed of the same materials, and the roof is either thatched with long grass, with the leaves of the nipa, or with a kind of bámbu sirap. The form and size of these cottages, as well as the materials employed in their construction, vary in the different districts of the island, and with the different circumstances of the individuals. In the eastern districts, where the population is most dense and the land most highly cultivated, a greater scarcity is felt of the requisite materials than in the western, and the dwellings of the peasantry are consequently smaller and slighter. In the latter, the frame-work of the cottages is generally made of timber, instead of bámbus, and the interior of them, as well as the front veranda, is raised about two feet from the ground. The accommodations consist of a room partitioned off for the heads of the family, and an open apartment on the opposite side for the children: there is no window either made or requisite. The light is admitted through the door alone; nor is this deficiency productive of any inconvenience in a climate, where all domestic operations can be carried on in the open air, and where shade from the sun, rather than shelter from the weather, is required. The women perform their usual occupations of spinning or weaving on an elevated veranda in front, where they are protected from the rays of a vertical sun by an extended projection of the pitch of the roof. In some of the mountainous districts, where the rains descend with most violence, the inhabitants provide against their effects, by constructing their roofs of bámbus split into halves, and applied to each other by their alternate concave and convex surfaces, all along the pitch of the roof, from the top down to the walls. On the whole, it may be affirmed that the habitations of the peasantry of Java, even those constructed in the most unfavourable situations and inhabited by the lowest of the people, admit of a considerable degree of comfort and convenience, and far exceed, in those respects, what falls to the lot of the peasant in most parts of continental India.
The class of dwellings inhabited by the petty chiefs are termed úmah chébluk or úmah jóglo. These are distinguished by having eight slopes or roofs, four superior and four secondary. Their value is from seven to eight dollars, or from thirty-five to forty shillings.
The largest class of houses, or those in which the chiefs and nobles reside, are termed úmah túmpang, and are of the same form as the preceding; they are generally distinguished from them by their greater size, which varies with the means and rank of the possessor, and usually contain five or six rooms. The supports and beams are of wood. The value of such a habitation, calculated to answer the circumstances of an ordinary chief of the rank of a Páteh, or assistant to the governor of a province, may be about fifty or sixty dollars, or from ten to fifteen pounds sterling.
In the European provinces, the size and comfort of these dwellings have of late been very essentially contracted, by the rigid enforcement of the monopoly of the teak forests, which were formerly open to the natives of all classes.
Brick dwellings, which are sometimes, though rarely, occupied by the natives, are termed úmah gedóng. This kind of building is for the most part occupied by the Chinese, who invariably construct a building of brick and mortar whenever they possess the means. The Chinese kámpongs may always be thus distinguished from those of the natives.
The cottages, which I have already described, are never found detached or solitary: they always unite to form villages of greater or less extent, according to the fertility of the neighbouring plain, abundance of a stream, or other accidental circumstances. In some provinces, the usual number of inhabitants in a village is about two hundred, in others less than fifty. In the first establishment or formation of a village on new ground, the intended settlers take care to provide themselves with sufficient garden ground round their huts for their stock, and to supply the ordinary wants of their families. The produce of this plantation is the exclusive property of the peasant, and exempted from contribution or burden; and such is their number and extent in some regencies (as in Kedú for instance), that they constitute perhaps a tenth part of the area of the whole district. The spot surrounding his simple habitation, the cottager considers his peculiar patrimony, and cultivates with peculiar care. He labours to plant and to rear in it those vegetables that may be most useful to his family, and those shrubs and trees which may at once yield him their fruit and their shade: nor does he waste his efforts on a thankless soil. The cottages, or the assemblage of huts, that compose the village, become thus completely screened from the rays of a scorching sun, and are so buried amid the foliage of a luxuriant vegetation, that at a small distance no appearance of a human dwelling can be discovered, and the residence of a numerous society appears only a verdant grove or a clump of ever-greens. Nothing can exceed the beauty or the interest, which such detached masses of verdure, scattered over the face of the country, and indicating each the abode of a collection of happy peasantry, add to scenery otherwise rich, whether viewed on the sides of the mountains, in the narrow vales, or on the extensive plains. In the last case, before the grain is planted, and during the season of irrigation, when the rice fields are inundated, they appear like so many small Islands, rising out of the water. As the young plant advances, their deep rich foliage contrasts pleasingly with its lighter tints; and when the full-eared grain, with a luxuriance that exceeds an European harvest, invests the earth with its richest yellow, they give a variety to the prospect, and afford a most refreshing relief to the eye. The clumps of trees, with which art attempts to diversify and adorn the most skilfully arranged park, can bear no comparison with them in rural beauty or picturesque effect.
As the population increases, the extent of individual appropriations is sometimes contracted; but when there is sufficient untenanted ground in the neighbourhood, a new village is thrown out at some distance, which during its infancy remains under the charge, and on the responsibility of the parent village. In time, however, it obtains a constitution of its own, and in its turn becomes the parent of others. These dependent villages are in the eastern districts termed dúku, and in the western or Súnda districts chántilan.
Every village forms a community within itself, having each its village officers and priest, whose habitations are as superior to those of others as their functions are more exalted. To complete the establishment in most large villages, a temple is appropriated for religious worship. Here is found that simple form of patriarchal administration, which so forcibly strikes the imagination of the civilized inhabitants of this quarter of the world, and which has so long been the theme of interest and curiosity of those who have visited the Indian continent.
In the larger villages, or chief towns of the subdivisions, in which the Kápala chútag, or division-officer, resides, a square place, corresponding with the álun álun of the capital, is reserved; and, in like manner, the mosque is found to occupy one side, and the dwelling of the chief another. The villages, whether large or small, are fenced in by strong hedges of bámbu, and other quick growing plants. All the large towns and capitals are formed on the same principle, each hut and dwelling being surrounded by a garden exclusively attached to it. In this respect, they are but large villages, although usually divided into separate jurisdictions. A newly-formed village contains but a few families, while in the capitals the population often amounts to several thousand souls. Súra-kérta, the capital of the chief native government, though its population is estimated to exceed one hundred thousand, may be termed an assemblage or group of numerous villages, rather than what in European countries would be called a town or city.
In the larger towns, however, and in the capitals, considerable attention is paid to the due preservation of broad streets or roads crossing in different directions. The inland capitals in the Súnda districts are distinguished by an extreme neatness and regularity in this respect; and although both these, and the greater native capitals at Sólo and Yúgy'a-kérta, may have been laid out principally at the suggestion of Europeans, it may be observed, that the same conveniences are also to be found in the extensive capital of Banyúmas, the planning of which must be ascribed entirely to the natives.