GOVERNMENT 263 



throughout the larger part of Borneo has been 

 similar to that of the acquisition of Sarawak by its 

 two English Rajahs. Dutch trading stations were 

 established in the south-west corner of Borneo as 

 early as 1604. I^ the seventeenth century stations 

 were established in southern Borneo by both 

 British and Dutch traders ; but the Dutch traders 

 extended their influence more rapidly than their 

 rivals, and by the middle of the eighteenth century 

 had secured a practically exclusive influence in 

 those parts. The British held possession of all 

 the Dutch East Indies during the brief period (18 11- 

 18 1 6) which was terminated by the Congress of 

 Vienna. On the retirement of the British, the Dutch 

 Government took over all the rights acquired by the 

 Dutch traders; and since that time it has continued to 

 consolidate its control and to extend the area of its 

 administration farther into the interior along the 

 courses of the great rivers. There were in the 

 area that is now Dutch Borneo several independent 

 Malay Sultans, of which the principal had their 

 capitals at Pontianak, Banjermasin, and Kotei. 

 In 1823 the Sultan of Banjermasin ceded a large 

 part of his territory to the Dutch government ; in 

 1844 the Sultan of Kotei accepted its protection; 

 and by similar steps by far the larger part of the 

 island has been marked out as the Dutch sphere 

 of influence. The water parting from which the 

 principal rivers flow east and west has been agreed 

 upon by the Dutch and the Sarawak governments 

 as the boundary between their territories ; and 

 though the upper waters of the great rivers which 

 flow west and south through Dutch Borneo have 

 up to the present time hardly been explored, 

 the authority of the Dutch Government is well 

 established over all the tribes of the coastal regions 

 and, especially in the south, extends far into the 

 interior, but is still little more than nominal 



VOL. II s 



