S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould

A History of Sarawak under Its Two White Rajahs 1839-1908


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on the coasts of their colonies, the Spanish sent an expeditionary force to punish Bruni, which it appears was very effectually done.

      The first Dutchman to visit Bruni was Olivier Van Noort, in 1600. He seems to have been impressed by the politeness and civility of the Bruni nobles, but, fortunately for himself, not to the extent of trusting them too much, for treachery was attempted. Nine years later, as we have noticed, the Portuguese had to make room for the Dutch at Sambas, and here the latter established a Factory, which was, however, abandoned in 1623. They returned to this part of Borneo in 1778, and established Factories at Pontianak, Landak, Mempawa, and Sukadana, but these proving unprofitable were abandoned in 1791. In 1818, an armed force was sent to re-establish these Factories, two years after Java had been restored to Holland by England, and from these, including Sambas, the Dutch Residency of Western Borneo has arisen.

      This is briefly the whole history of British enterprise in that part of Borneo lying north of the equator, and it reflects little credit on the part played by our countrymen in Eastern affairs in those days.

      Beyond this the Malays of Sarawak know little; but that these settlements must have early succumbed to the rising power of Bruni is evident. But it is also evident that after that power had commenced to wane, its hold over Sarawak gradually weakened until it became merely nominal. In 1609, the year they established themselves at Sambas, the Dutch found that these districts had fallen away from Bruni, as we have noticed. There may have been, and probably were, spasmodic assertions of authority on the part of Bruni, but it seems fairly evident that the Sarawak Malays managed to maintain an independence more or less complete for many years, up to within a very short period of the late Rajah's arrival, and then they had placed themselves again under the sovereignty of the Sultan, only to be almost immediately driven into rebellion by Pangiran Makota, the Sultan's first and last governor of Sarawak.

      Just a century after the Portuguese had shown the way, and had won for their king the haughty title of "Lord of the Navigation and Commerce of Ethiopia, Arabia, Persia, and India," the English and the Dutch appeared in the Archipelago. The latter under Houtman, who had learnt the way from the Portuguese under whom he had served, were the first, in 1595, if we exclude Drake,