When I arrived back in Meesterr Cornelis I learnt that I would have to stay there for a while; this didn’t suit me at all lookig at the daily travelling up and down from the hotel and the boarding costs there; so I accepted with both hands the suggestion from my contemporary Albrecht to stay in a small room in one of the annexes of his house in the Beerenlaan for a small compensation.
A bamboo bunkbed, a small straw mattrass and a field flynet were bought and I was organised. I wasn’t used to a siesta; besides it was so hot in the small room during the day that that would be out of the question and so I lounged on the front veranda of the main building in one of the lazy chairs.
The second day I had received my cabin luggage, although for the remainder and my piano I had to go to the Groote Boom in town to get them cleared
However, my large suitcase which had been packed by my carer and which contained just about all my possessions, was not made of solid construction and just when the civil servant at customs gave persmission to pass, the frontside of the suitcase bursted and a square jar of genever appeared. Wat a scene! With some difficulty I managed to clear everything without any costs.
My carer had still tried to smuggle the remainder of the liquor, which I had meant to give to the crew.
One morning, during the time I stayed in the Beerenlaan, I went outside through a backdoor of one of the annexes when I saw suddenly a buffalo madly coming towards me; I had only just time to escape through the door and heard the animal racing past. Since then I’ve always had a holy respect for these sweet little animals, who can still be so usefull and guided by a small native boy.
From the Chief of Arms I got a letter that I was placed at WillemI and within a few days had to go there. I was then discharged from my service with the supply depot and went just for a few days to my hotel, where I met a really helpful civil servant, Mr. Essers. Later on I heard that this man was a bit disturbed.
I don’t know how my piano and other goods had come aboard, still one fine day I found myself aboard this small paddleboat steamer WillemII, which was going to take me to Semarang. From that journey and how I arrived at WillemI I cannot remember a thing; it certainly wasn’t interesting.
The fame had gone ahead of me: they were going to get a lieutenant with a piano and I was welcomed with a loud cheer on the attic ( a row of small officer’s quarters with a communal front veranda on the top story ) . There I was also given one of the cages to live in.
The day after my arrival I reported at the engineer’s office with the first engineer officer in attendance, where I would be put to work, I also was incorporated in the then still existing company of Sappers, who were still armed with spears.
My immediate chief was the just promoted captain L.J. Resner, who at once gave me the old thick engineer’s regulations to study.
After a few days they instructed me to make a simple budget of which I didn’t make anything, as I had learned nothing about it. Resner who knew perfectly well that they had not taught me anything like that at the K.M.A., was extremely indignant, which didn’t prevent him to take me to the society after hours and invited me to have a drink.
He was basically not a good leader for young officers since he knew that I had to do spear excercises in the afternoon with the sappers; lucky I persued a give and take policy and ended the excercises well.
In those days it was rather rough at Willem I; the social club was always full and the wheel of fortune ran riot and brought even the calmest youngsters to drink; on the attic too real orgies were often held and because of my piano I had many visitors, which costed me a lot of money for beer and genever, so I soon fell financially backwards.
Stil, the more decent outings were not forgotten. Like I was a member of a theatre- a fencing and a singing group and was because of my piano playing also often guest with married families; all of these caused my evenings to be always occupied.
The colonel’s home at the edge of the fortress opposite the society was empty and in the large inner veranda of that palace on a certain evening a concert was given by the music club and I had to play my part in a duet of Le Reveil du Lion; my partner was a corporal of Infantery; we did well and during the interval we received from many compliments.
footnote:
for the interested: this is the piece he played:
A certain gentleman Groesse came to respect me his honours and in the course of the conversation it turned out that he was the same one, whom I had crowned with my slate at the Kloppenberg; meanwhile he still did not get any further than teacher’s aid.
As co-officers at the office I had Dumoulin and v. Haeften; the first one was deputy of lieutenant colonel Schafer and was intensly jealous of his really beautiful wife.One evening at a party at the lieutenant colonel’s I played commerce and came to sit next to Mrs. D.; with youtful galantery I knew how to play her three Ace’s in hands, so she won the whole game; D. then raced to me with the words: You are not allowed to play mean with my wife ( general amusement ).
V. Haeften was a regular peanut but a nice natured guy, sothat he slowly but surely became more useful for the service.On the attic the rough life went on as always; I could get a credit on my wages through the friendly handling of the firm Hobers in Harderwijk and so I swam in my money like a lice in feathers.
To keep my head above water I now had to sell my piano, which was taken over by a married lieutenant who lived outside the fortress in Ambawara; he paid half of it in cash and would finish off the payments of 20 guilders a month, the two last payments however I have never seen.
One certain Saturday evening there was a ball in the social club and I had danced intensly as respectable pupil of the late Spiets; after the ball the young folk sat around the big chat table and drank a glas of bourgogne and the plan was mentioned to row on to make a trip to Salatiga; the military pharmacist who due to his work could not go along and who had a riding horse, offered me the use of it and thus I could join the party too.After a cup of coffee we set off at sunrise via Ambawara and Bawen to Salatiga, where I saw friend? Mulder back for the first time.
In S. he made a big impression and pretended to be able to spend a lot of money; when I explained the case Hubers and asked him to now order something too I knocked on deaf ears: hij had no money at the moment, still made all kinds of promises, which he actually never fulfilled.
A year later he lay hands upon the cash in the cantine and was discharged from the service; I didn’t see him back until the year 1904, when he came begging to me
That day it was a long trip to Salatiga and I was dead tired in the evening and consequently I fell asleep on horseback between my two mates when riding home and lost my whip; my pharmacists horse was however very quiet and took me home peacefully.
My stay at Willem I luckily didn’t last long; on December 25 1870 already I was transferred to Batavia. I sold my bits of household goods for a good price to the European shopkeeper so I could pay the largest part of his bill and got ready for the journey.On the last evening I was asked to dinner with the Garrison doctor and would travel by night in view of the heat. In those days they travelled only in a travelwagon or on horseback; the government supplied a so called gentleman’s horse and for my servant a servant’s horse.
Captain of the artillery Broese v. Groenou had asked me to take his horse with me to Batavia and to deliver it to his brother, lieutenant at the artillery, who was known as an excellent horseman; I was allowed to use the horse as means of transport to Semarang, whilst they adviced me to let he fine animal only do walking pace, as it could otherwise show some tricks.After dinner with the doctor I mounted this beautiful gelding and had only taken a gentleman’s horse for my boy.
Everything went well until Bawen when the gelding suddenly stood still and in spite of al my efforts couldn’t make him move. Out of poverty I then crept onto the boy’s hack and let him lead the stubborn gelding by hand.
Because of all this misery I didn’t get to Oengaran at the hotel towards the morning.
Here a planter from the neighbourhood, who was also on his way to Semarang offered me a spot in his travelwagon, so I still got to Semarang on time.
So Mr. Broese might have given me a bargain, especially if you know that his younger brother several weeks later fell off the unwilling horse, which he was going to break in.
Nothing is left in my memory of the rest of the journey and I only know that I was put to work at the west engineer’s office and that I got a house appointed in block D at Waterlooplein.The first engineer present there was major Tromp, a man who wrote very long letters to justify himself, why he hadn’t finished a simple task yet and because of that they retired him quite soon and was replaced by major v. Goens, nicknamed Kees.
I was incorperated with the works under direct supervision of the already mentioned Cpt. Dozy, who for me was a much more pleasant chief than the one in Willem I. It was him who guided me every day and taught me, a whipper snapper, the true sense of duty;
I never forget how he and I on Saturday afternoons always did the so called washing on which all the week’s orders were discussed and checked; if this ended well then he closed the office, had his buggy put to the horse and took me with him to one of his friends or the social club.
My first job – it was still under major Tromp – consisted supervising the improvements of the beach batteries as a result of the French-German war; my part of the supervison was defined to the welcome battery and the battery Moeara Bahroe. The work for the first one was mainly to supervise the higher making of the travers which had to protect the gunpowder shed; it took quite some earth shifting and after several days when I came at the work terrain, I saw that the whole travers had disappeared; the weak underground had collapsed; they found a noticeable hill in the terrain at quite a large distance.
Consequently friend Tromp tried to vent his rage on me and a few spiteful words were said in the newspapers against the stupid engineer; thus a satiric cartoon from Mr. Deeleman, the inventor of the later welknown carts, appeared on which all the engineer officers in Batavia were busy whitewashing and tarring the walls of the welcome battery.
To get to the battery Moeara Bahroe we had to cross the canal and along the fishmarket and the small mosque, further following a small footpath through thick nypa palm trees; on one of my trips there a large croc raced passed my feet across the footpath; I have never in life had such a fright as at that occasion.
That neighbourhood was inundated with these pests, they also made the Batavia roads unsafe; the indigenous fishermen and prao sailors however considered them as holy and did them no harm; one of them even had the nickname Nabi ( prophet ) Jacob; this one they often gave pieces of meat from their canoes.