CHAPTER XVII 



From Labuan to Bruni on the Rajah's Gunboat — My Malay Servants 

 — -Labuan — Mr. H. Low — -The Vegetation at Labuan — Ptilocercus 

 Lowii — Kina Balu and its Nepenthes — Bruni — Reception by the 

 Sultan — Decay of the City — Parasites in Oysters — On the Name 

 Borneo — Climates of Bruni and Labuan. 



TAKING advantage of a kind invitation of the Tuan Muda, I 

 embarked on the morning of August 4th on the Heartsease for 

 Labuan and Bruni. The Tuan Muda was on board, but we were to 

 leave him a few miles lower down the river, at the trusan (channel), 

 for Mattang, as he was going to inspect his coffee plantation on that 

 mountain. 



The principal object of the gunboat's voyage was to convey to 

 Bruni the sum of $6,000, which the Rajah of Sarawak at that time 

 paid annually to the Sultan for the cession made by the latter of his 

 administrative and political rights over the districts of Muka and 

 Bintulu. The original territory of Sarawak, that ceded by Rajah 

 Muda Hassim to Sir James Brooke, extended only from Tanjong 

 Datu to the Samarahan river, about seventy miles of coast in a 

 straight line. 



I had with me supplies for a journey of four or five months, in- 

 tending, on the return from Labuan, to get landed at Bintulu, whence 

 I hoped to penetrate into the interior. I had only two men with 

 me, expecting to find others at Bintulu. One of my men, named 

 Sahat, who had been already some time in my service, came from 

 Miri, a village at the mouth of the Barram river, in the territory of 

 Bruni, and was well acquainted with the country I wished to ex- 

 plore. In the life of this man there was a mystery. He was at heart 

 a pirate, if not originally one. His instincts were cruel, and yet he 

 was honest, plucky, a first rate canoeman, and clever in most things 

 that natives can do. He spoke fluently several dialects, was a decent 

 cook, and could act on an emergency both as tailor and hairdresser. 

 Bakar, my second servant, a pure Sarawak Malay, who might w T ell 

 have been taken as a type of his race, was seventeen or eighteen years 

 old, of pleasing aspect and well-built figure. His character 

 was excellent, his demeanour serious, almost melancholy. He was 

 far from being stupid, and yet could not be called very intelligent '. 



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