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| THE JAVANESE ORCHESTRA - On Midway Plaisance
stood a large Javanese settlement, and, if
we except the Ferris Wheel, furnished the
best, most instructive, and least sordid entertainment of the
celebrated street. Centrally in the settlement was a large native
structure, made of bamboo, with thatched roof, from which
continuously issued the deep sounds of strange instruments, sad in
tone and monotonous, but always liquid and harmonious. It was said
truly that the deepest note of the Fair was touched in the Javanese
Theatre - a boom that impressed the hearer at a distance as if it
were the vibration of some great musical string. The engraving
reveals to the reader the methods by which this strange music was
made. The orchestra was called a gamelung, or gong band, and it was
organized and maintained by Mr. Kirkhovan, a wealthy Dutch planter.
The main instruments are not the single-stringed viol, seen in front,
for this is low and soft, but a series of hollow sounding
music-box-like xylophones, or dulcimers, which are accompanied by
beatings on a bronze gong more than six feet in diameter, and on
drums, which are seen at the right. The marionettes of the play are
stacked at the left. There was something very sad and sweet in the
little Javan people, and they were lovers of this music, which soon
became wearisome to an American who paid close attention to it. As a
distant accompaniment of conversation, however, it would produce
lasting memories in the minds of the visitor. |
