result, the conduct of the mines was left to the Chinese, and they were
unwisely permitted to work them in large companies of several hundred,
under their own overseers. This gave them the advantages of a compact
organization: to a dangerous degree they became a state within the
state.

When the war in China broke out, the Chinese residents at Sarawak,
sympathizing with their countrymen, were naturally greatly excited; and
when tidings came that the English fleet had been repulsed from before
the Canton forts, they were emboldened to take the desperate step of
attempting to put to death or to drive out of the country Rajah Brooke
and the rest of the English people, that they themselves might take
possession of it. About dusk on a February night, six hundred of them
gathered under their chiefs, armed themselves, went on board
cargo-boats, and began to float down the river towards the capital. At
midnight they attacked the Rajah's house. Its inmates were forced to
flee to the jungles. The Rajah rose from a sick-bed, ran to the banks of
the stream, dove under one of the Chinese boats, swam the river, and
took refuge with the Malays. Several of his countrymen were murdered.
His own house, filled with the priceless collections of a lifetime,
together with a costly library, was burned.

It was a gloomy morning which succeeded the night of this catastrophe.
Though he did not doubt for a moment the ultimate suppression of the
rebellion, what ruin might not be wrought in the few days or weeks which
should elapse before that event! And where, now that he had been driven
from his capital, he should find a base of operations to which he might
gather the scattered native forces, was the perplexing question of the
hour,--when, joyful sight, he beheld a merchant steamer sailing up the
river! He hailed her, went on board, and with a sufficient force steamed
up to Sarawak. With his appearance the last vestige of hope for the
insurrection disappeared.

Meanwhile stirring events had taken place. At first the natives were
stunned. They were roused at dead of night, to find the Chinese in
possession of the town, their Rajah's house in flames, the Rajah
missing, while the rumor was that he had been killed. For a time they
wandered about listlessly, vacantly staring each other in the face, and
it seemed as though they were about to submit without a struggle. In the
midst of this gloom and uncertainty, up spoke a Malay trader, whose
veins,