Note 1 — Chapter IV

About ten o’clock in the morning there was an unusual bustle on the principal highway which leads from the district Pandaglang to Lebak. “Principal highway” is, perhaps, too good a name for a wide footpath, which people called out of politeness, and from want of a better term, “the way;” but if you started with a carriage and four from Serang, the capital of Bantam,1 with the intention of going to Rankas-Betong, the new capital of the Lebak district, you would be sure to reach your destination some time or other. So it was a road. It is true you often stuck in the mud, which in the Bantam lowlands is so heavy, clayey, and sticky, that travellers are often obliged to ask the assistance of the inhabitants of the villages in the neighbourhood—even of those who are not in the neighbourhood, for villages are not numerous in these regions;—but if you did succeed at last in getting the assistance of a score of husbandmen, it did not take long to get horses and carriage again on firm ground. The coachman smacked his whip, the running boys—in Europe you would call them, I think, “palfreniers,”—but no, you have nothing in Europe which can give you an idea of these running boys.—These incomparable running boys, with their short thin switches, tearing alongside of the four horses, making indescribable noises, and beating the horses under the belly to encourage them, till—the vexatious moment arrived when the carriage once more sank in the mud. Then the cry for help was renewed; you waited till assistance was proffered, and then slowly resumed the journey. Often when I passed that way, I expected to meet a carriage with travellers of the last century, who had stuck in the mud, and been forgotten. But this never happened to me. Therefore I suppose, that every one who went that way, arrived at last at his destination. You would be mistaken, if you thought that all the roads in Java were in the same bad state. The military road with many branches, which Marshal Daendels2 constructed with great sacrifice of men, is indeed a masterpiece, and you are struck with wonder at the energy of the man, who, notwithstanding many obstacles, raised up by envious opponents at home, dared the displeasure of the population, the discontent of the chiefs, and succeeded in performing a task, that even now excites and merits the admiration of every visitor.