tall, and appeared to be the very perfection of savage warriors. They
invited us several times to pay them a visit on the hills, where they
resided. These Dyaks appeared very friendly to us, and one of them, an
intelligent fellow, of the name of Meta, volunteered to take a letter
overland to Mr. Brooke: his mode of travelling was by pulling up the
Saghai river to its source in his canoe, till he came close to the
source of the Coran, and by his account the two rivers nearly meet. He
took the letter, binding it round his head with a piece of linen; but I
do not know if ever it was delivered. One observation I made relative to
these Saghai Dyaks, which was, that much as they must have been
astonished at our arms and equipments, like the North American Indians,
they never allowed the least sign of it to be perceived.

At the end of a week the prisoners returned in a very miserable
condition. They had been at work, pounding paddy and digging yams; and
they stated that they had not sufficient allowed to eat to support
existence, besides being beat about the legs with bamboos. Two of the
twelve died evidently from ill treatment and exhaustion. Their gratitude
at being delivered from their slavery was beyond bounds; and it
certainly is not very creditable to the master of the Premier to have
abandoned them in the way he did, when a word from him would have
procured their liberty.

We returned to the ship, and the next day ran down to the Premier Reef;
the captain then went again to the Panti river, in the boats, to
conclude the treaty with the sultan of Gonong Tabor. This was soon
accomplished; and giving him an union jack to hoist, at which he was
much pleased, we bade him farewell.

We finished the survey of the Premier Shoal, as it is now named, and
then steered for the island of Maratua, which the sultan of Gonong Tabor
had by his treaty made over to the English, representing it as having an
excellent harbour and good water; but on our arrival we were much
disappointed to find an island surrounded by reefs, with only one
intricate passage through them and sufficiently wide only for boats.
Probably the sultan knew no better. As we were very short of water, we
now made sail for Sooloo, and fell in with the Sooloo prahu, which had
been sent to us as a pilot, and which we had never seen since she went
up the river Panti before us. She had been waiting for us outside, and
the people were very much pleased at finding us, as th