Page:Letters of a Javanese princess, by Raden Adjeng Kartini, 1921.djvu/125

LETTERS OF A JAVANESE PRINCESS make you happy with but one rejoicing letter, cheer you with the tidings that we had succeeded, that we had reached our goal. Alas, instead this bears a complaint; I do not like to complain but the truth must be told.

An unexpected turn has come in our affairs; the question is now more difficult than ever; it is a matter of standing or falling, of blessed success or of complete undoing, and—OUR HANDS ARE BOUND.

There is a duty which is called gratitude; there is a high holy duty called filial love, and there is a detestable evil called egoism! Sometimes it is so difficult to see where the good ends, and the bad begins. One may go a certain distance, and then the boundary between the two extremes is hardly visible. Father's health is such that he is subject to severe heart attacks. Do you know what that means? We are defenceless—delivered over to the pleasure of blind fate.

We have stood so close to the fulfillment of our dearest wishes, and now we are again far away. It is a bitter awakening after we had thought that all stumbling blocks had been cleared from our way. The poor, tortured heart cries out, "What is my duty?" and no answer comes, while those who wait grope round in deepest darkness.

We can no longer seek for consolation in that splendid plan of the Government to open a school which would educate the daughters of Regents to become teachers; nothing will ever come of it. For many Regents whose consent had to be obtained, declared themselves against any innovation that would interfere with the custom of secluding young girls, and releasing them from their imprisonment by allowing them to go away from home to school.

It has been a hard blow for us, for we had built all our hopes upon it. Adieu illusions — adieu golden dreams of the future! You were too beautiful to be true. —103—