The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-02-08

|
Investigation Committee has per-
ceived the necessity of taking a trip
through Java, the Pearl of the Orient,
and it's sister island, Sumatra, or at
| least through such parts of the latter
island as are in condition to be visited
without fatal consequences.
In these possessions of Holland
many of the problems that face the
United States in the Philippines have
| been under process of methodical and
cosy, if not brilliant, solution for al
most a century.
For a century the Dutchman's bur-
| den in Achin has amused itself by
! flouting his authority and also cutting
his head off, whenever possible, and
smoking it to be preserved. Every
| few months the patient and optimistic
Hollander announces to an Indifferent
world that the last fight has been
fought and that within a day or two
thereafter the Dutch troops will enter
VIGOROUSLY into the capital of the
Achinese. But somehow one never
hears of that final victorious arrival,
that what percentage of the Dutch
| troops does at last enter the Achinese
capital, does so in the form of souVe-
Mrs of the occasion.
The Achinese sits in simple ease
and with cheerful readiness to do
| murder in his country of Achin, which
| lies in the northern end of Sumatra.
| When the Dutch send troops out from
| Batavia they face about the same
| proposition as If they had to send
troops through wild and mountainous
country from New York to Chicago,
for that is about the length of Suma-
| ira.
Beyond the fact that the Achinese
are exceedingly industrious in their
national profession of killing persons
| who inavde them, little is known
| about them. They do not encourage
| visits, and Achin is pre-eminently a
bourne from which no traveller re-
| turns.
Consequently, the most accurate and
reliable statistics that even the statls-
tic-mad Dutchman can produce about
this brother of our own Tagalogs is
| that more than 10000 stout Dutch
soldiers have departed this life and
about $100,000,000 stout Dutch dol
lars have done the same, in efforts to
| make the Achinese a good Dutchman.
| And the net result is that the Achinese
| is identically as free, murderous and
native as he was before the first
Dutchman landed on Sumatra.
The Much-Mixed Battaks.
South of Achin are several millions
of kindly savages who are the result
of an ingenious mixture of the blood
of Malays from the Malay Peninsula,
head-hunting Dyaks of Borneo and
gentle Hindoos. This mixture which
is known as Battak is highly success
full in its own way. Some of the tribes
have the fad of cannibalism. Others
have chosen the Dutchman's square
| face" and under the soothing infiu-
ences of his gin and his money, they
labor in the pepper and tobacco plan
tations and are model citizens ac-
cording to their dim lights.
AS in the Philippines, the Dattos, or
native chiefs, have been, and are the
most serious of the many factors in
the tangled problem of colonial en-
pire.
The Dutchman has treated the
Datto with placid and truly Dutch
ponderosity, sitting upon him in state.
with constant assurances that he is
sitting somewhere else entirely.
So it is that the Javanese is happy
in the conviction that his Holy Dat
tons or Kings still rule him. The
Emperor" of Surakarta still holds
his gorgeous Imperial Court in beau
tiful Surakarta, whose landscape looks
as If it were chiseed out of lapis lazuli
and emerald. The twenty-one other
kings and princes and dattos have
their grand ministers. Their people and
| their officials still crawl toward them
on hands and knees.
SO careful is the placid Dutchman
not to hurt the feelings of his burden
that the Dutch resident who is sta
toned in each of these twenty-five
provinces of Java is not even known
as governor, although he is the great
boss, with almost all powers of a
| King. Instead his title is that of
elder brother to the King or Datto.
\ The Javanese Prince is a holy per-
son, indeed, to his subjects. They
approach him only with awed venera-
ton, and his wish is sacred.
Princes in Golden Cages.
Almost all of the twenty-five native
rulers are immensely rich Indeed. if
it can be said that any human being
can have without stint whatever he
desires, be it what it may, it NAV be
said of these Javanese greatnesses.
whose divine authority is recognizes
by the majority of the SO. 000 900 peo-
pie who dwell in the Dutch East In
dies.
There is only one exception to the
list of what they may have. That one
exception is freedom. The Javapesa
ruler is a precious bird in a golden
cage. To do him honor. a squadron
Of squares houlderel Dutch cavalry
never fails to cort him, when he gees
out.
To make sure that he shall not incur
illness or fatigue by going out too
often, the elder brother has so ar
ranged IL in each residency that His
Royal Highness shall never venture
from his gnlden ralaca llnlu that c-cna