GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE ISLAND OF BORNEO, 369 
pulation, and when the Davaks have found protection and support 
from the European authority, then the latter will be able to dictate 
its laws and to maintain its power over the Malay princes of the 
coast have who submitted to it, or with whom treaties have granted 
the right of intervention. To know with exactness the courses of the 
principal rivers and their affluents ; to determine their depths, and 
Indicate how far they are navigable, are indispensible measures in a 
country which presents no other means of communication with the 
interior. We ought also to ascertain -which rivers are most con¬ 
stantly frequented by the indigenous populations and upon the si¬ 
nuous holders of which the greatest number of their villages are es¬ 
tablished ; it will be necessary to undertake researches to obtain 
precise data concerning some principal villages which can he se¬ 
lected by the Dayaks as entrepots for their petty traffic by barter 
with the Malays of the coasts, and this particularly with, the aim of 
establishing there our posts or small factories, and thus placing our¬ 
selves in relation with the tribes who will resort there to provide 
themselves with the first necessaries, articles of which it will be es¬ 
sential to know the nature and the kind desired or sought amongst 
the inhabitants. The greater number of these tribes without 
doubt, have their habitations constructed in the vicinage or along 
the hanks of these large rivers ; probably also they are situated in 
localities where other streams join the principal river; it is there 
that we ought to fix provisionally the establishment or chief place of 
our commercial transactions with these people ; it will be necessary 
as far as the locality will admit, that this principal factory be esta¬ 
blished in the centre of the country. Now that river navigation 
avails itself of iron steamers, it appear to us that there no longer ex¬ 
ists any difficulty which could materially obstruct an experiment of 
this nature, which appears to be the only proper way for opening up 
to us the interior parts of Borneo. We shall have still some obser¬ 
vations to make on this subject in treating of projects of exploration 
and of colonizatiun in this island. 
The'geographical position of Borneo relatively to the other pos¬ 
sessions of the Netherlands in these seas j the very great number 
