A History of Sarawak under Its Two White Rajahs 1839-1908. Baring-Gould Sabine

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СКАЧАТЬ the natives' forbearance, and in disgust they are gradually abandoning all garden cultivation. Already brushwood is taking the place of bananas and yams, so that few of either are to be had. The people say it is useless for them to plant for others to eat the whole produce. Then as the natives cannot furnish the supplies exacted of them by the pangirans, these latter take from them their children; the lads are circumcised and made Mahomedans and slaves, and the girls are drafted into the already crowded harems of the rajahs." The same writer gives an instance or two of the manner in which the subject natives were treated. In 1855, the warlike Kayans of the interior descended the Limbang river and threatened a tribe of Muruts. The Pangiran Makota,75 virtual governor of Bruni, met them and arranged with the chiefs that for the sum of £700 they should spare these Muruts. Then he set those who were menaced to collect the money. When they had done this and placed the sum in his hands, he pocketed it and returned to Bruni, leaving the Kayans to deal with the tribe after their own sweet will.

      Again, in 1857, the same head-hunters threatened another Murut village. Makota had a secret interview with the Kayan chiefs, and then gave out that peace had been concluded. What he had actually done was to deliver over to them to pillage and exterminate the Murut village of Balal Ikan, against which he bore a grudge for having resisted his exactions.

      The whole of the north and west of Borneo was in a condition of indescribable wretchedness and hopelessness when Mr. James Brooke appeared on the scene. Oppression the most cruel and grinding, encouragement of piracy and head-hunting by the selfish, unscrupulous pangirans sent from Bruni, were depopulating the fair land. Sarawak, then a very small province, was, as we shall see, in insurrection. Single-handed, with but a comparatively small capital, the whole of which he sank in the country, with no support from the British Government, with no Chartered Company at his back, he devoted his life to transform what had become a hell into what it has become, a peaceful and happy country.

      APPENDIX TO CHAPTER II

      LIST OF THE MAHOMEDAN SULTANS OF BRUNI

      Taken from the Selesilah (Book of the Descent), preserved in Bruni, by the late Sir Hugh Low, G.C.M.G. Published in the Journal No. 5 of the Straits Branch R.A.S.

      1. Sultan Mahomed, who introduced the religion of Islam.

      2. Sultan Akhmed, brother of above, married to the daughter of Ong Sum Ping, Chinese Raja of Kina-batangan. No sons, but one daughter married to —

      3. Sultan Berkat, from Taif in Arabia. A descendant of the prophet through his grandson Husin. Berkat, the blessed. His real name was Sherif Ali.

      4. Sultan Suleiman, son of above, who was succeeded by his son —

      5. Sultan Bulkeiah;76 towards the end of his reign Pigafetta's first visit to Bruni in 1521 probably took place.

      6. Sultan Abdul Kahar, son of above. Had forty-two sons, of whom —

      7. Saif-ul-Rejal succeeded him. During his reign the Spaniards attacked Bruni in 1576 and 1580, taking it on the second occasion.

      8. Sultan Shah Bruni, son of above. Having no children he abdicated in favour of his brother —

      9. Sultan Hasan, succeeded by his son.

      10. Sultan Abdul-Jalil-ul-Akbar, succeeded by his son.

      11. Sultan Abdul-Jalil-ul-Jehar, who was succeeded by his uncle —

      12. Sultan Mahomet Ali, son of Sultan Hasan.

      13. Sultan Abdul Mubin. Son of Sultan Mahomet Ali's sister. He murdered his uncle and usurped the throne. He was worsted in a revolution that lasted twelve years, and was executed.

      14. Sultan Muaddim, fourth son of Sultan Jalil-ul-Akbar, nephew and son-in-law of Sultan Mahomet Ali. Succeeded by his nephew (half-brother's son) —

      15. Sultan Nasr Addin, grandson of Sultan Jalil-ul-Akbar.

      16. Sultan Kemal-Addin, son of Sultan Mahomet Ali, who abdicated in favour of his son-in-law —

      17. Sultan Mahomet Ali-Udin – on his father's side grandson of Sultan Muaddin, on his mother's side great-great-grandson of Sultan Jalil-ul-Akbar. He died before his father-in-law and great uncle, Sultan Kemal-Addin, who again ascended the throne and was succeeded by his son —

      18. Sultan Omar Ali Saif-udin. Died 1795. Succeeded by his son —

      19. Sultan Tej-Walden. Died 1807. He abdicated in favour of his son —

      20. Sultan Jemal-ul-Alam, who reigned for a few months only, and died in 1796, when his father reascended the throne and was succeeded in 1809 by his half-brother —

      21. Sultan Khan Zul-Alam, succeeded by his great-nephew and grandson —

      22. Sultan Omar Ali Saif-udin, second son of Sultan Mahomed Jemal-ul-Alam. Died 1852. He left the throne, by will and general consent of the people, to

      23. Sultan Abdul Mumin, who was descended from Sultan Kemal-Addin. Died 1885, succeeded by

      24. Sultan Hasim-Jalilal Alam Akamaddin, son of Sultan Omar Ali Saif-udin. Died 1906.

      25. Sultan Mahomet Jemal-ul-Alam, son of above.

      The above are abridged extracts. The last two sultans were not included in Low's list, which was made in 1893. Low's spelling of the names is followed.

      Forrest, op. cit., who obtained his information from Mindanau records, states that about 1475 a Sherip Ali and his two brothers came from Mecca. Ali became the first Muhammadan prince in Mindanau; one brother became King of Borneo (Bruni) and the other King of the Moluccas. As regards the date this agrees with the Bruni records, and the brothers might have borne the same name. (See Mahomet Ali, Omar Ali above.)

      According to Chinese records, a Chinese is said to have been King of Bruni in the beginning of the 15th century.77 This would have been in Ong Sum Ping's time, and it probably refers to him.

      CHAPTER III

      THE MAKING OF SARAWAK

      James Brooke was born at Benares on April 29, 1803, and was the son of Thomas Brooke of the East India Company's Civil Service. He entered the Company's army in 1819, and took part in the first Burmese war, in which he was severely wounded, and from which he was invalided home in 1825. He had been honourably mentioned in despatches for conspicuous services rendered in having raised a much needed body of horse, and for bravery. Then he resigned his commission, and visited China, Penang, Malacca, and Singapore. There he heard much of the beauty and the wonders of the fairy group of islands forming the Eastern Archipelago, and of the dangers to be encountered there from Malay pirates; islands rich in all that nature could lavish in flower and fruit, in bird and gorgeous butterfly, in diamond and pearl, but "the trail of the serpent was over them all." Very little was known of these islands, few English vessels visited them, the trade was monopolised by the Dutch, who sought to exclude all European nations from obtaining a foothold. They claimed thousands of islands from Sumatra to Papua as within their exclusive sphere of influence, islands abounding in natural products which they exploited imperfectly, and did nothing to develop. This was a dog-in-the-manger policy to which Great Britain submitted.

      The young man's ambition was fired; he longed to explore these seas, to study the natural history, the ethnology, to discover gaps in СКАЧАТЬ