20 BRITISH BORNEO. 
lowed up by its offspring, which, under its white ruler, has 
developed a vitality never evinced under the rule of the Royal 
house of Brunai in its best days.* 
The limit of Sarawak’s coast line to the South-West is Cape, 
or Zanjong, Datu, on the other side of which commences the 
Dutch portion of Borneo, so that expansion in that direction 
is barred. To the North-East the boundary is Labuk Pulai 
the Eastern limit of the watershed, on the coast, of the 
important river Barram which was acquired by Raja BROOKE, 
in 1881, for an annual payment of £1,000. Beyond this com- 
mences what is left of the Brunai Sultanate, there being but 
one stream of any importance between the Barram river and 
that on which the capital—Brunai—is situated. But Sarawak 
does not rest here; it acquired, in 1884, from the then Pange- 
ran Tumonggong, who is now Sultan, the Trusan, a river to 
the East of the Brunai, under somewhat exceptional circum- 
stances. The natives of the river were in rebellion against 
the Brunai Government, and in November, 1884, a party of 
Sarawak Dyaks, who had been trading and collecting jungle 
produce in the neighbourhood of the capital, having been 
warned by their own Government to leave the country be- 
cause of its disturbed condition, and having further been warned 
weered also by the Sultan not to enter the Trusan, could not 
refrain from visiting that river on their homeward journey, 
in order to collect some outstanding trade debts. They were 
received is so friendly a manner, that their suspicions were 
not in the slightest degree aroused, and they took no precau- 
tions, believing themselves to be amongst friends. Suddenly 
in the night they were attacked while asleep in their boats, 
and the whole party, numbering about seventeen, massacred, 
with the exception of one man who, though wounded, manag- 
ed to effect his escape and ultimately found his way to La- 
buan, where he was treated in the Government Hospital and 
made a recovery. ‘The heads of the murdered men were, as 
is customary, taken by the murderers. No very distinct 
reason can be given for the attack, except that the Trusan 
* On the 17th March, 1890 the Limbang River was forcibly annexed by 
Sarawak, subject to the Queen’s sanction, 
