346 



MY LIFE 



[Chap. 



them, it was only as a trophy of war. In their own villages 

 crimes are very rare. Ever since Sir James Brooke has been 

 rajah, more than twelve years, there has only been one case 

 of murder in a Dyak tribe, and that was committed by a 

 stranger who had been adopted into the tribe. One wet day 

 I produced a piece of string to show them how to play * cat's 

 cradle,' and was quite astonished to find that they knew it 

 much better than I did, and could make all sorts of new 

 figures I had never seen. They were also very clever at 

 tricks with string on their fingers, which seemed to be a 

 favourite amusement. Many of the remoter tribes think the 

 rajah cannot be a man. They ask all sorts of curious ques- 

 tions about him — Whether he is not as old as the mountains ; 

 whether he cannot bring the dead to life ; and I have no 

 doubt, for many years after his death, he will be held to be a 

 deity and expected to come back again. 



" I have now seen a good deal of Sir James, and the more 

 I see of him the more I admire him. With the highest 

 talents for government he combines in a high degree good- 

 ness of heart and gentleness of manner. At the same time, 

 he has so much self-confidence and determination that he 

 has put down with the greatest ease the conspiracies of one 

 or two of the Malay chiefs against him. It is a unique case 

 in the history of the world for a private English gentleman 

 to rule over two conflicting races — a superior and an inferior 

 — with their own consent, without any means of coercion, 

 but depending solely upon them both for protection and 

 support, while at the same time he introduces some of the 

 best customs of civilization, and checks all crimes and bar- 

 barous practices that before prevailed. Under his govern- 

 ment ' running-a-muck/ so frequent in other Malay countries, 

 has never taken place, and in a population of about 30,000 

 Malays, almost all of whom carry their kris^ and were accus- 

 tomed to revenge an insult with a stab, murders only occur 

 once in several years. The people are never taxed except 

 with their own consent, and in the manner most congenial to 

 them, while almost the whole of the rajah's private fortune 

 has been spent in the improvement of the country or for its 



