v.] ENGLISH OCCUPATION OF BALEMBANGAN. 109 



aliqtdd doubtless lingered even in the flesh-pots of civilisation, for 

 whenever he was given " shore-leave " he immediately did his best 

 to lose himself in the jungle. 



From the shore the magnificent outline of Kina Balu, the great 

 mountain of Borneo, was visible to the S.S.W., eighty miles 

 away, but our attention and interest was directed to a nearer 

 object — the island of Balembangan — where, a hundred years 

 before, the inhabitants of the East India Company's settlement 

 had been massacred almost to a man. In those days neither 

 Singapore, Malacca, nor Penang was English, and it was considered 

 above all things important to establish posts in the neighbourhood 

 of China. Accordingly, when, in the middle of the last century, 

 the Sultan of Sulu was found imprisoned in Manila on the occupa- 

 tion of that city by the English, Admiral Drake succeeded in 

 obtaining from him the cession of Balembangan as a reward for his 

 release. A post was established there in 1763, which acted in some 

 degree as a check upon the pirates with which these seas at that 

 time swarmed. The garrison at first numbered nearly four hundred 

 men, composed of Sepoys and Europeans, in addition to Bugis traders 

 and others, but at the time of the massacre in 1775 the climate 

 had told so severely on the inhabitants of the little settlement that 

 only seventy-five infantry and twenty-eight gunners were left to 

 defend it. The position was a tolerably strong one, but the guns 

 all pointed seawards, and in rear the fort was but little protected. 



The Spanish were at this time intriguing against the English in 

 Sulu, where opinion seems to have been divided among the Datus, 

 some being in favour of the English while others wished to expel 

 them. The Datu Tenteng, together with his cousin the Datu 

 Dakula, belonged to the latter party, and as much with the hope 

 of obtaining a heavy booty as from any political reason, determined 

 on attacking the English. His force consisted of three hundred 

 men, most of whom were Sulu and Illanun pirates. The sequel of 

 the story is best given in the words of a Spanish historian, which I 

 extract from Belcher's " Voyage of the Samarang " : — 



