But the latter suggestion we would not listen to, and so we were soon on our way with the villagers, and upon the road to the city we were joined by many hundreds of others, all journeying to witness the grand reception of the chief nobles by their Prince. But as this ceremony takes place annually, a general description of it must suffice.
At an early hour of the day, each chief, accompanied by his retainers attired in their gala dresses and fully armed, and attended by drums and other musical instruments, proceeds to the great square of the palace, there to await the coming of the Prince. I must here premise that every portion of the ceremony is an outrage upon Mahomedan decorum, at least as established in other countries; but then the Javanese, although followers of the Prophet, are extremely lax in all religious matters. When the Prince makes his appearance, it is in the idolatrous garb of his Hindoo ancestors, decorated with ponderous golden bracelets, armlets, and finger-rings set with diamonds. His retinue consists of persons whimsically dressed in the ancient costume of Java, including a great number of women, a strange contradiction to the fastidiousness of the Mahomedans of other countries. The most conspicuous of the latter are his Highness’s ladies of the household—these bear the ancient regalia. The latter, by the way, according to American notion of regalia, is somewhat extraordinary, consisting, for instance of old creeses, the golden figures of a snake, a goose, and a deer;—equally curious is the regalia of the Prince of Macassar or Celebes, which consists of the Book of the laws of God, the fragment of a small gold chain, a pair of Chinese dishes, an enchanted stone, a pop-gun, some creeses and spears; and, above all, a revered weapon, called sudang; i. e., a kind of cleaver or hanger, the object of which, according to the naked language of the people themselves, is to rip open bellies. But to return to the Java prince.
After the ladies came several old women, bearing arms in their hands, called langan-astru, very appropriately too, for the meaning is soldiers in play. The Prince, having arrived at the Sitingil, or terrace of ceremonies, takes his seat upon the throne, the chiefs of all ranks, from the highest to the lowest, squatting on the bare ground, the heir to the throne only being admitted to a higher seat. The troops of all descriptions, whether those of the household, or the rabble militia of the princes, then pass before the Prince in review, moving mostly according to the manners of the country, in a strutting or dancing attitude, and exhibiting costumes the most grotesque and ludicrous. Some appear in ancient dress, others in the more modern garb of the country. One portion of the ceremony consists of a public charity according to the institution of the Prophet. This consists of dressed food, chiefly rice, piled up into a conical mass, of four or five feet high, tastefully decorated with flowers, and each mass supported in a separate litter, borne amidst the sounds of a hundred bands of native music by porters dressed for the occasion. From their shape and size, and still more, because they are thought to be emblematic of the bounty of the sovereign, these masses of food are emphatically and figuratively denominated mountains.
The method of distributing these viands is as curious as it is, to say the least, ungracious; for, after being duly exhibited in the procession, the mountains are carried to the houses of the nobles of rank, according to their size and qualities, and being thrown down in their courtyards, there ensues, among the retainers of the chiefs, an indecent but amicable scramble for them.
There is, however, one portion of the festivities that seriously outrages the institutions of the Prophet. It is at the latter part of the day, when wine is served plentifully, and the Prince quaffs some half a dozen bumpers off to the health of his good friends and allies. Now, this latter ceremony was the only portion of the festival to which we could not be eyewitnesses, as it took place in the banqueting-hall of the palace, and in the presence only of the guests and attendants. It appeared, however, to be the only portion that Prabu was very desirous of witnessing. To do this, he offered a bribe to one of the principal slaves, but as it would have been at the risk of his life, the man refused. Thus he was obliged to wait in the city till the conclusion of the banquet, and then content himself with its description from the mouth of one of the attendants. This the man did very circumstantially and tediously, and Prabu listened attentively for some time, but at the sentence—“and then his Highness, taking a flagon of wine in both hands, stood up, and drank it to the dregs to the health of the Dutch envoy, and his masters, the Government at Batavia, between whom and himself there was, and ever had been, a good and completely peaceful understanding”—our captain, losing all self-control, gnashed his teeth, and clutched the handle of his creese, exclaiming,—
“False-hearted tyrant and coward, he has betrayed his country!”
But the astonishment depicted upon the countenance of the reciter of the speech at such treasonous words restored him to his self-possession, and, taking the man by the shoulder, he said,—
“A long journey has made me mad. Not a word of this to a living soul, as you value your life, for”—the rest he whispered in his ear.
“The son of Surapati,” exclaimed the man, and stricken and falling upon his knees, he added—“Allah be praised! the people, oh, prince! wail thee as dead, or, worse, in the power of the Dutch.”
Then dismissing him with a wave of his hand, Prabu said to us,—