and of
Alfred Jones, Adjutant
Shere Singh, Regimental Sergeant-Major
of the British North Borneo Constabulary
Killed at Ranau 1897-98
and of
George Graham Warder
District Officer, Tindang Batu
Murdered at Marak Parak
28th July 1903
This Monument Is Erected as a Mark of Respect
by their Brother Officers

Though Sandakan is the chief port of British North Borneo, with a
population of perhaps fifteen thousand, it has barely a hundred
European inhabitants, of whom only a dozen are women. Girls marry
almost as fast as they arrive, and the incoming boats are eagerly
scanned by the bachelor population, much in the same spirit as that in
which a ticket-holder scans the lists of winning numbers in a lottery,
wondering when his turn will come to draw something. If the bulk of the
men are confirmed misogynists and confine themselves to the club bar
and card-room it is only because there are not enough women to go
round. The sacrifice of the women who, in order to be near their
husbands, consent to sicken and fade and grow old before their time in
such a spot, is very great. With their children at school in England,
they pass their lonely lives in palm-thatched bungalows, raised high
above the ground on piles as a protection against insects, snakes and
floods, without amusements save such as they can provide themselves,
and in a climate so humid that mushrooms will grow on one's boots in a
single night during the rains. They are as truly empire-builders as the
men and, though the parts they play are less conspicuous, perhaps, they
are as truly deserving of honors and rewards.

There is no servant problem in Borneo. Cooks jostle one another to cook
for you. They will even go to the length of poisoning each other in
order to step into a lucrative position, with a really big master and a
memsahib who does not give too much trouble. But there are other
features of domestic life for which the plenitude of servants does not
compensate. Because existence is made almost unendurable by mosquitoes
and other insects, within each sleeping room is constructed a
rectangular framework, covered with mosquito-netting and just large
enough to contain a bed, a dressing-table and an arm-chair. In these
insect-proof cells the Europeans spend all of their sleeping and many
of their waking hours. S