252 PIRACY IN THE INDIAN ARCHIPELAGO. 
To understand rightly the character of Malayan piracy, we 
must extract from good authorities, the description of the first 
and second class pirate prahus, and thence we may form a 
judgement, how far a number of these vessels would be ca¬ 
pable of capturit g a merchant vessel with a European crew, 
or a Chinese junk. The courage and audacity of these ma¬ 
rauders are attested by every competent person, and proved 
by their acts, and we need go no further than to mention the 
testimony given by Sir James Brooke, the late Captain Charles 
Grey, and Captain Wallage on tiiis point, who all three 
declared the coolness and fire eating propensities of the Ba- 
linini in action with the Nemesis , as worthy of all praise even 
from an enemy. 
Forrest in his voyage to NewjjGuinea, as early as 1775, gives 
(at page 225) the dimensions of a pirate prahu, which he ac¬ 
tually measured. “She was,” he writes “from stern to 
tafferil 91 feet 6 inches, in breadth 26 feet and in depth 3 feet 3 
inches.” Her complement was ninety men and she could 
“row with forty oars or upwards of a side.” She bad 
e mi aged and captured a Dutch sloop, and brought 70 slaves 
to Mindanao. Sir Stamford Raffles, writing of piracy in 1811, 
(page 47 of Raffles' Memoirs) quotes from a letter of Mr 
Burn, as follows:—“A few days ago Pangeran Anam, 
came out from Sambas, with two smalt ships ; one of them 
mounts ten guns, and the other eight guns, with some armed 
prahus. Two Chinese junks just arrived from China, and 
then lying on the bar of the Pontianak river were attacked 
by their boats . One of these junks having a valuable cargo 
on board, was boarded and carried off instantly by them, the 
other was relieved by the Sultan's armed prahus who went to 
their assistance.”* 
Captain Congalton saved a Chinese junk from capture by 
12 Balinini prahus, and many, very many Chinese junks have 
been captured by these pirates at various times, as might be 
shewn if needful, and indeed what could save them falling a 
prey to one vessel, above described, when we find a Chinese 
junk cut out by the boats of a pirate squadron ? 
Again, Temminck thus describes a Lanun prahu captured 
in 1843 by a Dutch expedition, “ Continuant leur exploration, 
ils brulerent 34 praline dans le detroit deBonerote; puisse ils 
donnerent chasse a 17 grands batiments pirate de Magindano 
dont deux feurent detruits; ceux-ci portaint 100 homines d' 
* About this time the ship Commerce, haring lost her rudder and anchor*, 
wta takao and burnt by Pangeran Semuoda not Rdjk of Sarawak, but Pangeran 
.MacOta's fathervidejdem. 
