How many were actually shouting is hard to say. The voices of Ardesch, Tollens, and Thieme were heard, as was that of a retired official turned wealthy storekeeper. According to Van Rees’s most reliable informant, the government official R. van Nauta (who the assembly had appointed to Van Hoëvell’s committee to draw up a bill), the scene had degenerated into a “Polish beer garden” with everyone talking at the same time, “in groups, on chairs, behind and in front of the table” set up for the steering commit- tee. Someone pushed through the crowd to say that the coastal trade, in the hands of Arabs, had totally ruined him, a point he wanted addressed in the petition. Tollens and Thieme insisted on a free press and presented lists to sign.

Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ E…, loc. 501