Page:Max Havelaar; or, the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company (IA dli.granth.77827).pdf/150

 “For, chiefs of Lebak, there is much to be done in your district.

“Tell me, is not the labourer poor? Does not your paddy often ripen for those who did not plant it? Are there not many wrongs in your country? Is not the number of your children small?

“Is there no shame in your souls when the natives of Bolang, which lies over there in the East, visit your country, and ask, ‘Where are the villages, and where the husbandmen, and why do not I hear the gamlang, which speaks joy out of a mouth of brass, nor the stamping of paddy by your daughters?’

“Is there no bitterness in journeying from here to the South coast, in seeing the mountains that have no water on their sides, or the plains where the buffalo never drew the plough?

“Yes, yes, I tell you, that your soul and mine are sad because of these things; and, therefore, we are grateful to Allah, that He has given us the power to labour here.

“For we have in this country fields for many, though the inhabitants are few. And it is not the rain which fails, for the summits of the mountains suck the clouds of heaven to the earth. And not everywhere are rocks that refuse a place to the root; for in many places the ground is soft and fertile, and calls for the grain, which it is willing to return you in a bended blade. And there is