hest favor
of the regent of Bandong. He was the only rahnat-player in the
gammelang, but there were some two hundred timbrels, half a dozen drums,
ten or twelve tom-toms, twenty violins, sixteen pairs of cymbals, and
any imaginable number of horns, flutes and flageolets. I leave the
reader to imagine the amount of noise produced by such a combination: my
ears did not cease tingling for a week. But everybody praised the music,
and evidently enjoyed the fun. The dancing was like all Oriental
dancing, very voluptuous and enthusiastic, adapted especially to display
the exquisite charms of the performers and move the passions of the
audience. The play that followed possessed no merit, except in the
bewildering beauty of the girlish actresses, and their superb adornments
of natural flowers artistically arranged in coronets and wreaths, with
costly pearls and diamonds. The play itself was simply a farce--a series
of ridiculous passages between some lovesick swains and their rather
tantalizing lady-loves, who eventually escaped, amid a shower of roses
and bon-bons, from their pursuers, and disappeared behind a huge palm
tree, which the next instant had vanished into air, roots, branches and
all.

After a somewhat adventurous ascent of Mount Tan-kon-bau-pra-hou, a
hurried visit to the volcanoes of Merbabou and Derapi (the former nine
thousand feet high, the latter eight thousand five hundred), and a
glimpse at the sacred woods of Wah-Wons, we turned our faces toward
Sourakarta and Djokjokarta, the two grand principalities of Java still
remaining under native rule. Each is governed by an independent sultan,
whom the Dutch have never been able to subjugate; and they are allowed,
only by sufferance, to keep a diplomatic agent or "resident" at the
courts of these monarchs. We had been forewarned, ere setting out on our
tour, of the state maintained by these proud Oriental princes, and the
utter impossibility of obtaining an audience without fulfilling to the
very letter all the requirements of courtly usage. So we had sent
forward some costly presents to each of the sultans, with letters
written in Arabic and French, praying for the honor of an interview. Our
messenger to the court of Sourakarta soon returned, accompanied by a
native officer and five soldiers in full uniform, with a courteous
letter of welcome from the sultan to his capital. He did not say to his
_court_, and we were left in doubt as to whether we should see him,
a