Page:Scidmore--Java the garden of the east.djvu/142

122 close Council of India. In fact, suggestions for the actual autonomy of Java have been uttered aloud. There are ominous signs everywhere, and the government finds its petty remnant of coffee-culture and grocery business a more vexing and difficult venture each year. The Samarang "Handelsblad," in commenting on it, says:

"The Javanese are no longer as easily led and driven as a flock of sheep, however much we may deplore that their character has changed in this respect. The Javanese come now a great deal into contact with Europeans, the education spread among them has had an effect, and communication has been rendered easy. They do not fear the European as they did formerly. The time is gone when the entire population of a village could be driven to a far-off plantation with a stick; the pruning-knife and the ax would quickly be turned against the driver in our times. The Javanese to-day does not believe that you are interested in his welfare only; he is well aware that he is cheated out of a large proportion of the value of the coffee that is harvested. Some people may think it a pity that the time of coercion is coming to an end in Java, but that cannot change the facts. The dark period in the history of Java is passing away, and every effort to prevent reforms will call forth the enmity of the natives."

The state committee on government coffee-plantations says in its latest reports:

"It cannot be denied that the intellectual status of the Javanese at the present day is very different from that during the time when the coffee monopoly was introduced. The reforms which we have introduced