"That, again, is another thing," he said. "I can't understand that: as far as I was concerned, I knew my native through and through. But possibly every European feels it in a different way, according to his nature and his temperament. To one it is perhaps the dislike which he begins by feeling for the country that attacks him in the weak point of his materialism and continues to oppose him ... whereas the country itself is so full of poetry, I might almost say mysticism. To another it is the climate, or the character of the native, or what you will, that is antagonistic and incomprehensible. To me ... it was the facts which I could not understand. And until then I had always been able to understand a fact ... at least, I thought so. Now it appeared to me as though I no longer understood anything.... In this way, I became an incompetent official and then I realized that it was all over. And then I quietly resigned my post. And now I'm here ... and here I mean to stay. And do you know the strange part of it? Perhaps I have--at last--found my family-circle here...." The little brown faces were peeping round the corner. And he called to them, beckoned to them kindly, with a broad fatherly gesture. But they pattered away again, audibly, on their bare feet. He laughed: "They're very timid, the little monkeys," he said. "It's Lena's little sisters; and the woman you saw just now is her mother." He was silent for a second, quite simply, as though she was bound to understand who Lena was: the very young woman, with the golden bloom on her cheeks and the coal-black eyes, of whom she had caught a fleeting glimpse. "And then there are some little brothers, who go to school in Garut. Well, you see, that's my domestic circle. When I came to know Lena, I adopted the whole family. I admit it costs me a lot of money, for I have my first wife at Batavia, my second in Paris, and René and Ricus in Holland. It all costs me money. And now my new 'home-circle' here. But now at least I have my circle.... It's a very Indian kettle of fish, you'll say: that Indian quasi-marriage to the daughter of a coffee-overseer, with the old woman and the little brothers and sisters included in the bargain. But I'm doing a little good. The family haven't a cent and I'm helping them. And Lena is a dear child and is the comfort of my old age. I can't live without a wife; and so it happened of itself.... And it works very well: I lead a cabbage-life and drink first-rate coffee; and they look after the old man...." He was silent and then continued: