Life in the forests of the Far East (vol. 2 of 2)

by Sir Spenser St. John

I am not anxious to find fault with past mismanagement, but to recommend to the bishop of Labuan and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, the abandonment of a system which has proved a failure. If I rightly understand the intention in establishing the mission, it was to endeavour to spread Christianity among the Dayaks, and this has not been as yet fairly attempted. I believe one of the reasons for the deplorable secession of men who had acquired some knowledge of the language and the people, was keeping them too much at Kuching. They wanted to have a home of their own among the Dayaks, where a personal interest could be created, where their work would be clear to them, and where their efforts would produce results.

Ten missionaries out of fourteen have abandoned their duties in Borneo, and it is most probable that few of them would have left had a defined work been placed before them, and had they been told to consider a certain tribe, or a certain group of tribes, as their own to manage;—in fact, placing them in a similar position to a clergyman in his parish in England.

I think this plan should be well weighed before it is rejected, as in two instances it has been partially tried, and has in some degree succeeded, as at Lundu and Lingga.

That the present management is decidedly faulty, may be gathered from this, that of all the officers in the Sarawak government service who have been employed there during the last fourteen years, I only know of one who has abandoned his position, and that one under peculiar circumstances; while, as I have said, five-sevenths of the missionaries have left their posts, though their work is not harder, certainly not nearly so dangerous as that of the officers, and is as well paid.

I am quite sure that a missionary placed as Mr. Gomez is, among an interesting people like the Sibuyaus of Lundu, would never think of abandoning them, unless from being disheartened by ill-considered and unnecessary interference. He has acquired a great influence among them, and is personally liked by the whole tribe. I have heard the Dayak Chief speak of him with the greatest respect, saying, “He is to us as our father—he watches over us, and does everything to produce unanimity among us.” It was one of the Lundu converted Dayaks who in the year 1859 first gave notice to the Government that some discontented, discarded Malay chiefs were hatching plots against the Europeans.

At Lingga, also, one of Mr. Chambers’s Dayak friends sent the same warning; and this leads me to the consideration of what a change it would effect in Sarawak if the mass of the Dayaks were Christians. The Sarawak government officers are fully alive to this, and the missionary is heartily welcomed at every station, and every assistance and encouragement given him that can be done without awakening the jealousy of the Mahomedans. Care, of course, is necessary where a government rules all religions, and depends for its principal support on the Malays. If a few thousand Dayaks were Christians, they would become the mainstay of the Europeans.

It has been partially forgotten that the Dayak will not generally come and ask to be converted, particularly if it involves a journey of twenty miles. The missionary must be with him always, understand his ways and his language, feel an interest in his local affairs, and assist him with his matured advice.

With regard to the missionaries themselves, they should not only be earnest men, but have a practical acquaintance with the world, and this knowledge cannot be better obtained than at Oxford, Cambridge, and our other universities. Medical acquirements are also of singular use to the missionary. The present bishop of Labuan possesses them to a remarkable extent; and I, among the other Englishmen who have dwelt in Sarawak, have to thank him for a patient and skilful attendance.

Perhaps no position is more difficult than that of the head of a mission; it requires the greatest tact, the calmest temper, the most complete government of tongue, a generous enthusiasm to warm the enthusiasm of others, a knowledge in the management of men and things, rarely found. I have heard that the bishops of New Zealand and Columbia answer to my description. Too often men otherwise estimable, when they are placed in authority, become overbearing, coarse in their manner towards subordinates, hasty in temper, uncertain in arrangement, and ungenerous to the foibles of their associates; and, if to these unfortunate qualities be added a systematic disparagement of the work done by others, unwarranted expressions about their neighbours, and continued and unnecessary absence from their posts on trifling pretexts, much injury must be done to the missions placed under their care, and would account for the failure of many.

In thus publishing my own opinion of the mission, I am but giving the result of the experience of a looker-on, who has no practical acquaintance with the management or working of religious societies; but as a disinterested observer, I have made some recommendations which cannot at once be followed, though all may be in time.