Page:Max Havelaar; or, the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company (IA dli.granth.77827).pdf/105

 delicate health. He had fine features, that certainly bore witness of intellectual development. But there was something cold in his glance, something that made you think of a table of logarithms; and though his aspect on the whole was not unpleasing or repulsive, one could not help thinking that the very large thin nose on that face was annoyed because there was so little stir.

He politely offered his hand to a lady, to help her in getting out, and after he had taken from a gentleman who was still in the coach, a child, a little fair boy of about three years old, they entered the ‘pendoppo.’ Then that gentleman himself alighted, and any one acquainted with Java would immediately observe that he waited at the carriage door to assist an old Javanese baboe (nurse-maid). Three servants had delivered themselves out of the little leather cupboard that was stuck to the back of the coach, after the manner of a young oyster on an old one.

The gentleman who had first alighted had offered his hand to the Regent and the Controller Verbrugge, which they accepted with respect; and by their attitude you could see that they were aware of the presence of an important personage. It was the Resident of Bantam, the great province of which Lebak is a district,—a Regency, or, in official language, an Assistant Residency. I have often, when reading works of fiction, been offended at the little respect of the authors for the taste of the public,