had subscribed. It was under Government patronage—the editor was an officer of the General Secretarial Department—and so the subscriptions were paid into the Treasury. They presented to me a bill for twenty guilders. As this money had to pass through the Governor’s office, and therefore the receipt, if the debt remained unpaid, would similarly pass through that office to be returned to Java, I took the opportunity of protesting on the back of this document against my poverty:—
Adieu, Copiste, adieu! Trop malheureux destin:
Je meurs de faim, de froid, d’ennui et de chagrin,
Vingt florins font pour moi deux mois de nourriture!
Si j’avais vingt florins je serais mieux chaussé,
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![1]
“But when afterwards in Batavia I visited the Editor of The Copyist to pay my twenty guilders, I found that I owed nothing. It appeared that the General himself had paid this money for me in order not to be compelled to return the illustrated bill to Batavia.”
“But what did he do after . . . after . . . your taking that turkey? It was after all . . . theft! And after that epigram?”
“He inflicted a terrible punishment! If for these facts he had brought me to justice as guilty of disrespect to the Governor of the West Coast of Sumatra, which in those days with a small stretch might have been interpreted as ‘an effort to undermine Dutch authority and an incitement to rebellion’ or ‘larceny on the King’s highway,’ he would have shown himself a kind-hearted man. But no, he punished me more effectively . . . miserably! the man who had charge of the turkeys was ordered next time to choose another way. And my epigram . . . alas, that was still worse! He said
- ↑ I have left this untranslated from the French in which it was written, to give an idea of Multatuli’s skill in writing verse in a foreign language at the age of 23. Trsl.
