BORNEO 241 



attacked and captured by a Spanish force of 650 infantry 

 and artillery, with a squadron of three war-steamers and 

 sixteen smaller armed vessels, under the Governor- 

 General of the Philippines, and the resistance made will 

 show the formidable character of these pirates. The 

 Spaniards had 1 officer and 20 men killed, and 10 

 officers and 150 men wounded. They stormed four 

 redoubts, captured 124 cannon, mostly of small calibre, 

 and burnt 150 praus. Four hundred and fifty of the 

 enemy were killed, refusing to take quarter, and 200 

 captives rescued from slavery. The forts and houses of 

 the inhabitants were levelled to the ground, and in order 

 to make the place uninhabitable the coco-palms were cut 

 down to the number of between 7000 and 8000." In 

 1879 the Balagnini murdered or kidnapped sixty-live 

 people in North Borneo, and have since then committed 

 other minor acts of piracy, but it is believed that these 

 outrages are now, practically speaking, things of tiie 

 past. 



7. Agriculture and Products. 



Agriculture, as we understand it, is hardly known except 

 in those parts of the country where the people have been 

 taught by Europeans. Horses and oxen are almost 

 unknown among the Dyaks, but buffaloes are very numer- 

 ous, and are specially suited for work in so marshy a 

 country. A good account of the native system of 

 cultivation is given by a writer in the Handbook of 

 British North Borneo. " A piece of ground is selected — 

 usually one that has undergone the same treatment a 

 few years previously — the felling and clearing is conducted 

 in the usual manner, after which Indian corn and paddy 

 (rice) are planted simultaneously. Ploughs and hoes are 



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