by Multatuli
And that was why little Max was not allowed to play in the garden, and why Tina didn’t take as much pleasure in the flowers as she had anticipated on the day of her arrival in Rangkasbitung.
It goes without saying that such petty annoyances as these had no effect on the mood of a small family with so many ingredients for a happy home life. Such trifles were not the cause of the frown on Havelaar’s brow upon his return from some of his excursions, or after meeting with one petitioner after another. We heard in his address to the chiefs that he intended to do his duty, that he intended to fight Injustice, and I hope the conversations reported here have introduced him to the reader as a man capable of discovering and bringing to light things concealed from public view or shrouded in darkness. It may therefore be assumed that not much of what went on in Lebak escaped his attention. We have also seen that he had taken an interest in Lebak many years earlier and was thus already well informed about his new station on that first day, when Verbrugge went to meet him in the pendopo where my story began. Now that he could investigate there in person, he found much to confirm his earlier suspicions, and in particular, he learned from the archives that the region entrusted to his care really was in a most deplorable condition.
He saw that his predecessor in Lebak, Assistant Resident Slotering, had made these same observations in his notes and letters. Reading the correspondence with the chiefs, he found reproach after reproach, threat after threat, and understood very well why Slotering had finally said he’d go directly to the government unless this state of affairs was brought to an end.
When he’d first heard about this from Controleur Verbrugge, Havelaar had replied that it would have been wrong of Mr. Slotering to do so, since an Assistant Resident in Lebak was under no circumstances permitted to go over the head of a Resident in Banten, and he had added that nothing could justify any exception to this rule, since it was unthinkable that any Resident would endorse extortion and exploitation.
And such endorsement was in fact inconceivable—at least, in the sense meant by Havelaar—since it was not as if the Resident in question stood to benefit in any way from such offenses. Nevertheless, the Resident had a motive for not giving due consideration—except very reluctantly—to Slotering’s complaints. We have seen how the said predecessor spoke to his superior several times about the prevalent abuses—they had conferred, as Verbrugge put it—and how little good this did. It is therefore worthwhile to investigate why such a high-ranking official, who as the head of the entire residency was every bit as responsible for seeing justice done as the Assistant Resident—nay, even more so—more often than not actually saw fit to impede the course of justice.96
During Havelaar’s stay at the Resident’s home in Serang, he had broached the subject of the abuses in Lebak and been told that “such things happen everywhere, to some degree or other.” Well, that much Havelaar could not deny. Who would claim to have seen a country where no wrong was ever done? But he held that this was no reason to allow known abuses to persist, especially not when one was explicitly obliged to prevent them, and also that, judging by all he had learned about Lebak, these things were not happening “to some degree or other,” but to a very high degree. The Resident responded by saying, among other things, that conditions were even worse in the regency of Cirebon—which was also part of Banten.
Now if we assume, as we may, that a Resident derives no direct benefit from extortion and the lawless exploitation of the natives, the question remains why he allows such abuses to continue, despite his oath and his duty, and without informing the authorities. It is very strange indeed, when you think about it, that the existence of such abuses should be coolly acknowledged by a Resident, as if they lay beyond his power and authority. I will try to unravel how this comes about.
It is almost always unpleasant to bring bad tidings, and it seems that some trace of the unpleasantness of such tidings always clings to the man whose unhappy task it is to deliver them. While this alone might lead some people, against their better judgment, to deny the existence of some inopportune fact, how much greater the temptation when you run the risk not merely of incurring the disfavor that is the messenger’s inevitable fate, but of actually being regarded as the cause of the unfortunate situation you are duty bound to disclose.
The government of the Dutch East Indies prefers to inform its masters in the mother country that everything is going according to plan. So that is what Residents prefer to report to their superiors. The Assistant Residents, who receive almost nothing but good news from their controleurs, likewise prefer not to send disagreeable tidings to the Residents. The result is an artificial optimism in the official record of events, in contradiction not only to the truth but also to the personal opinions of the optimists themselves, whenever the same subjects arise in conversation, and—stranger still!—in contradiction to their own written communications. I could cite many reports that extol the thriving state of a place while also including facts, and especially figures, that belie this description. These examples would provoke laughter and ridicule if the whole business didn’t have such grave consequences, and it’s amazing to see the naivety with which the crudest lies are told and accepted as true, even though, only a few sentences on, the writer himself provides the means to undermine those lies. I will limit myself to a single illustration, to which I could add very many others. Among the documents here before me is the annual report of a certain residency. In it the Resident boasts that trade is flourishing, claiming that great prosperity and activity may be seen throughout the region. A little further on, however, in reference to the limited means at his disposal for catching smugglers, he is at pains to disabuse the authorities of the disagreeable notion that his residency loses a great deal of revenue to evasion of import duties. “No, no,” he writes, “no need to concern yourself about that! Little or nothing is smuggled into my residency, because . . . so little business is done in these parts that no one would dream of risking his capital in trade.”
I have seen a report of this kind that opened with the words, “In the past year, this peaceable place has remained at peace.” If nothing else, such a sentence suggests a remarkable peace of mind about the government’s peaceful intentions towards all who protect it from unpleasant tidings, or who, to use the accepted term, do not “embarrass” it with depressing news!
If the population fails to increase, this can be attributed to the inaccuracy of earlier censuses. If tax revenues don’t increase, why, that can be presented as a virtue: the low rates have encouraged agriculture, which has just begun to flourish and will soon—preferably after the author’s term of office—yield fabulous results. Any turmoil that is impossible to conceal is blamed on a small gang of malefactors who will no longer cause any trouble now that overall contentment prevails. If want or famine has thinned the population, it was surely the result of crop failure, drought, rain, or something of the sort, and never of misgovernment.
I have in front of me the note in which Havelaar’s predecessor attributes the “movement of the population out of the Parangkujang district” to “outrageous abuses.” This was an unofficial note, and contained points about which that official wished to speak to his superior, the Resident of Banten. But Havelaar combed the archives in vain for any sign that his predecessor had openly and explicitly reported the matter in a public dispatch.
In short, the official communications from civil servants to the government—and hence the reports to the authorities in the mother country, which are based on those communications—are largely and essentially . . . untrue.
I realize that this is a serious charge, yet I stand by it and feel fully capable of supporting it with evidence. If this candid expression of my opinion disturbs you, please consider how many millions of pounds and how many human lives could have been saved by the British if someone had managed to open their eyes to the true state of affairs in India,† and what a deep debt of gratitude they’d have owed to the person brave enough to deliver the bad ne
ws, so that by rectifying the situation before it was too late, they could have avoided all the bloodshed.
I have said that I have evidence for my charge. Where necessary, I will prove that there have been frequent famines in regions celebrated as the very picture of prosperity, and that often when the people are described as peaceful and contented, they are on the verge of exploding with wrath. I do not intend to supply the evidence in this book, although I trust that by the time you lay it down, you will be convinced that such evidence exists.
For the moment, let me give just one example of the absurd optimism I have described, an example that anyone, no matter how unfamiliar with life in the Indies, can easily understand.
Residents are obliged to submit a monthly statement of rice imports and exports in their residency, divided into two categories: those within Java and those to and from more distant places. Examining the volume of rice exported from one residency to another in Java, we find that it exceeds, by many thousands of piculs, the volume of rice that, according to those same statements, was imported from one residency to another in Java.
I will not dwell on what to think of the acumen of a government that accepts and publishes such statements. Instead I merely wish to draw the reader’s attention to the purpose of this deception.
The percentage bonuses awarded to European and native officials for growing crops to be sold on the European market had done so much to discourage rice production that some regions were afflicted by famine, which no conjuring tricks could conceal from the public eye. I have mentioned that regulations were made at that time to prevent matters going so far wrong ever again. The many official communications required by those regulations included the aforementioned statements of rice imports and exports, which were meant to enable the government to keep a constant eye on the ebb and flow of that staple. Exports from a residency represent prosperity, imports relative scarcity.
If we examine and compare those statements, we learn that there is such an abundance of rice throughout Java that all the residencies together export more rice than is imported by all the residencies together. Let me repeat that overseas exports aren’t included in these figures, but are accounted for separately. This brings us to the preposterous conclusion that there is more rice in Java than rice in Java. Now that is what I call prosperity!
As I mentioned before, the perceived need to send the government nothing but good news would be risible if the consequences were not so tragic. How can we expect all these wrongs ever to be righted, if there is a preconceived intention to twist and distort the statements sent to the administration? What, for instance, can we expect of a people who, though meek and gentle by nature, have complained of oppression for years and years, when they see one Resident after another go on leave or into retirement, or move on to a new office, without having done anything to redress the grievances that weigh so heavily upon them! Will a coiled spring not, sooner or later, bounce back? Will long-suppressed discontent—suppressed, so that the authorities can go on denying it!—not finally ignite into rage, despair, and riot? Will this road not lead to insurrection?
And where will those officials be then, who have come and gone in succession over the years without ever conceiving of any greater mission than being in the government’s good books? A greater mission than pleasing the Governor-General? Where will they be then, the writers of vapid reports, whose untruths have blinded the administration? Will they, who lacked the courage to commit one bold word to paper, rush to arms to defend the Dutch possessions? Will they reimburse the Netherlands for the enormous costs of quelling an uprising or preventing a revolution? Will they restore life to the thousands who have fallen through their negligence?
But it is not those officials, those controleurs and Residents, who bear the greatest guilt. It is the government itself which, as if struck with inexplicable blindness, encourages, incites, and rewards the submitting of favorable reports.97 This is especially true when the population is oppressed by native chiefs.
Many people attribute the protection of the chiefs to the ignoble calculation that those native leaders, who are expected to sway the people with pomp and circumstance and thereby uphold the authority of the government, would have to be much better paid for this work than they are now if they weren’t free to supplement their income by unlawful claims to the labor and property of the population. Whatever the case may be, the government never enforces the provisions meant to protect the people of Java from extortion and robbery, except as a last resort. Nebulous and often spurious reasons of state are put forward for sparing this regent or that chief, and there is a belief in the Indies—so firm that it has become a proverb—that the government would rather dismiss ten Residents than a single regent. If the political pretexts have any basis, it’s usually in false reports, since every Resident has an interest in exaggerating the influence of his regents over the people, to provide himself with a cover if he is ever criticized for granting those regents excessive latitude.98
I will not, at this time, dwell on the vile hypocrisy of the humane-sounding provisions—and oaths!—that protect the people of Java, on paper, from exploitation, and I ask the reader to recall how Havelaar, when repeating those oaths, showed signs of an emotion much like contempt. For now I will simply point out the difficult position of a man who—for reasons utterly separate from any recited formula—considers himself bound by his duty.
And this difficulty was even greater for Havelaar than it would have been for some other men, because his nature was gentle, in utter contrast to his intellect, which as the reader has learned was decidedly sharp. So he had to contend not only with anxiety about what people might do and his concerns about career and promotion, and not only with his duties as a husband and father—no, above all, he had to defeat an enemy within his own heart. Whenever he saw suffering, he suffered, and it would lead me too far astray to give examples of how he always, even when injured and insulted, protected his opponents from themselves. He told Duclari and Verbrugge that in his youth he had been drawn to dueling with sabers, which was true . . . but he didn’t mention that he nearly always wept after wounding an adversary, or that he had nursed his sworn enemies back to health like a Sister of Charity. I could tell of the time in Natal when a chained convict shot at him,99 and he took the man into his home, spoke friendly words to him, had him fed, and granted him his freedom in preference to anyone else, because he believed he had discovered the reason for the man’s bitterness: his sentence, pronounced elsewhere, had been too severe. Havelaar’s tender nature was usually either denied or considered ludicrous—denied by those who confused his heart with his mind, and considered ludicrous by those who failed to see what could induce a reasonable man to bother about rescuing a fly from a spider’s web. It was also denied by everybody—save Tina—who then heard him disparaging those “stupid insects” created by “stupid Mother Nature.”
But there was yet another way to drag him down from the pedestal on which those who knew him—whether or not they liked him—felt bound to place him. “Yes, he is witty, but . . . there’s something superficial in his wit,” or, “He is intelligent, but . . . he doesn’t use his intelligence properly,” or, “Yes, he is kindhearted, but . . . he makes a show of it!”
I will make no claims as to his wit or intelligence. But his heart? Poor struggling flies that he saved when no one was about, will you defend that heart of his against the charge of showing off?
But no, you’re off and away without a thought for Havelaar, you, who couldn’t have known he would need your testimony one day!
Was Havelaar showing off when, having seen a dog named Sappho fall into the estuary in Natal, he jumped in after her, because he feared the pup couldn’t swim well enough to dodge the sharks that swarm in those waters? Surely the showing off is less plausible than the kindness?
I call on you, the many who knew Havelaar—if you haven’t frozen to death in the winter cold like the rescued flies, or shriveled up in the heat down there, s
outh of the equator! I call on you to testify to his heart, all of you! I call on you with confidence, because there’s no longer any need to look for ways to rope him in and drag him down from even the lowest pedestal.100
Meanwhile, however out of place it may seem, I will leave room here for some lines by Havelaar himself, which may even render your testimony superfluous. There was a time when Max was far, far away from his wife and child, having been obliged to leave them behind in the Indies while he went to Germany. Showing the quick mind I credit him with—but wouldn’t go so far as to defend, should anyone wish to challenge it—he mastered the language after just a few months in the country. Here are those lines, originally written in German, which also sketch the intimate bond between him and his loved ones.
—My child, the bell is tolling nine o’clock!
The night wind whispers, and the air grows cool.
Too cool for you, perhaps—your brow is burning!
You’ve been at play all day, out running wild.
You must be tired. Come here, your tikar’s ready.101
—Oh, mother, let me stay a moment longer!
It is so sweet to rest here . . . and inside,
when I lie on my mat I’ll sleep so deep
I won’t know what I’m dreaming! If I stay