another than when we walked amongst them. I have, however, not depended
on memory alone for the records of twenty years, but have journals and
letters to refer to, which my friends in England have been good enough
to keep for me. Some parts of "Letters from Sarawak" I shall incorporate
into the present little book, for as it treats of the first six years we
lived there, and was written at that time, it is sure to be tolerably
correct.

In those days, from 1847 to 1853, Sir James Brooke was very popular in
England. The story of his first occupation of Sarawak, published in his
journals, and the cruizes of her Majesty's ships in those eastern
seas--the _Dido_ and the _Samarang_--were read with avidity, and
furnished the English public with a romance which had all the charm of
novelty. However difficult and inconvenient it might be for the English
Government to recognize a native State under an English rajah, who was
at the same time a subject of the Queen of Great Britain, this question
had not then arisen; and all classes, high and low, could applaud a
brave and noble man, who had stepped out of the beaten track to spend
his fortune and expose his life in the cause of savages. There were many
fluctuations of sympathy and opinion in after years towards Sir James
Brooke; but, through evil report and good report, through difficulty and
danger, Sarawak has still advanced, and is as worthy of the interest of
the best and wisest of mankind as it was in 1847. At this time, indeed,
it seems to me to furnish a lesson in the management of native races
which might be useful in our own colonies. English governors always set
out with good intentions towards the natives of savage countries, but
how is it that war almost always follows their occupation? Surely it is
because the settlers go there, not in the interest of the native race,
but their own, and the two interests are sure to clash in the long-run.

It requires great patience and forbearance to educate natives up to a
rule of justice and righteous laws; but that it may be done, and carry
the co-operation of the people themselves, is evident at Sarawak, where
the Malays and Dyaks are associated in the Government, and have always
stood by their English rajah, even when it was necessary to punish or
exile some of their own chiefs. I am aware that an English colony cannot
be governed in this way; nevertheless, the spectacle of wild natives,
rising by the influence of a few good E