In 1817 the naturalist Caspar Georg Carl Reinwardt founded a scientific botanical garden in Buitenzorg (present-day Bogor) – the National Botanical Garden (nowadays Kebun Raya) – that would come to serve as the colony’s centre for botanic research. He had chosen this location because Buitenzorg was located on higher ground and was, therefore, cooler than Batavia and received more rainfall. Plants were sent here from the entire archipelago to be examined for their exploitative potential. The garden was so beautiful that it soon became a tourist attraction as well. Numerous travellers visited the garden and recorded their experiences in writing. Justus van Maurik praises it as ‘the glory of Buitenzorg, no! of the entire Indies’. And the Eurasian writer Dé-Lilah observes: ‘Walking through the lofty avenues of the Park of Buitenzorg that morning, however, I did not think of its significance for science; all I saw was the delightful splendour of everything around me.’ She claims it is the most beautiful garden in the world, lovelier than Kew Gardens or the botanical gardens of Berlin, Paris or Vienna. It emanates an ‘ineffable charm’ that made her speechless, as if she was ‘wandering around in a dream’. It was especially the pond with its white lotus flowers and the avenue with ‘sombre’ waringin [banyan] trees that delighted her. From the garden, visitors could also admire the palace of the governor-general, the highest government official in the colony. This palace, also in Buitenzorg, nowadays serves as the Indonesian president’s country residence for official occasions.
‘Vue du palais de Buitenzorg, prise du parc’, by A.J. Bik, 1842. [KITLV 47B23]