ment in it . . . striving after effect . . . the style is bad . . . the writer is inexperienced . . . no talent . . . no method . . .”
Right, right, all right! But . . . the Javanese are maltreated!
For: disproof of the main tendency of my work is impossible!
For the remainder, the louder the disapproval of my book, the better I shall like it, for so much the greater will be the chance of being heard. And that is what I wish!
But you, whom I disturb in your “pressures” of occupations, or in your peaceful “retirement,” you Ministers and Governor-Generals, do not depend too greatly on the inexperience of my pen. It might gain practice, and with a little exertion it might perhaps attain to an efficiency which in the end would cause the truth to be believed even by the People! Then I should ask that People for a place in its Representation, were it only for the purpose of protesting against certificates of integrity that Indian Specialists mutually present to each other, perhaps to suggest the extraordinary idea that they themselves attach value to that quality . . .
In order to protest against the endless expeditions and acts of heroism against poor miserable creatures who have first been forced to rebellion by maltreatment.
In order to protest against the shameful cowardice of circulars that besmirch the honour of the Nation by invoking public charity for the victims of chronic piracy.
It is true, those rebels were starved skeletons, and those pirates are able-bodied men!
And if that place were refused me . . . if people persisted in not believing me . . .
Then I should translate my book into the few languages that I know and into the many languages that I can still learn, so that I might ask from Europe what I had in vain sought in the Netherlands.
And in all the Capitals songs would be sung with refrains like
