A great deputation, one of the most influential that ever waited on a Minister, had an interview with Lord Derby, but all to no purpose. His lordship was as unsympathetic as he could well be. He failed to appreciate the noble conduct of the Rajah, and could only look upon his efforts in Sarawak as a sort of speculation—half commercial, half political. He had evidently not taken the trouble to study the subject, or he was incapable of appreciating a generous nature. But the Cabinet was not of the same opinion, and soon overtures were made by Lord Malmesbury with reference to a Protectorate being granted by England. Before anything could be settled, however, Lord Derby’s Ministry resigned.
The Rajah was now again worried by his pecuniary embarrassments. The Borneo Company pressed for the repayment of the £5000 advanced after the Chinese insurrection, but a generous lady came forward and freed him from this claim. At the same time some of his friends raised a testimonial to mark the appreciation of his public work. Had there not been some underhand opposition by those who pretended to support it, it might have reached the amount expected, namely, £20,000, but it only realised £8800. With a portion of this he bought the small estate of Burrator on the skirts of Dartmoor, and here he ever felt truly at home. He became strongly attached to the place, and it was difficult to make him leave it even for a season. It was a charmingly wild spot, under the shadow of the great tors which render the country about them so wonderfully picturesque. The air is pure and bracing, and his sojourn there may be said to have relit the lamp of life which had been almost extinguished.
In Sarawak affairs were in a bad state. The unreasonable efforts made by its Government to support Pangeran Matusin in Muka, the savage instigator of the civil war, were the cause of much strife, and the illegal conduct of the officer administering the Government was deeply resented in Borneo. The Sarawak officials were possessed with the monomania that the Sultan of Borneo was always intriguing against them, which was a pure myth, as the Brunei Government had neither the energy nor the power to affect them.
The intriguers were within their own territories, for whilst they were watching for outside plots and hostile action, a dangerous conspiracy was being hatched by some discontented chiefs. The heads of this conspiracy were the ex-Datu Patingi Gapoor, now named Datu Haji, as he had made the pilgrimage to Mecca, who had been permitted to return to Sarawak after the Chinese insurrection, and Sherif Musahor, a chief of Arabian descent, established on the Rejang. The first evidence of this treachery was the surprise of the fort at Kanowit, and the murder of two Sarawak officers, Messrs Fox and Steele. Yet so ignorant of the real plotters were the English officials at the capital, that when an expedition was sent to punish the murderers, Tani, one of our best friends, was accused as an accomplice and was executed. As he was led forth to death he protested his innocence, but added, ‘You will soon know who is the real culprit.’ In the end not one of the actual murderers escaped, as they were tracked for years, and were all ultimately killed.
Sherif Musahor, however, was the real instigator of these murders, and the truth soon came out that the Datu Haji and he were the promoters of all the disturbances. The former was banished and the latter driven out of the country. He had practically no influence in Sarawak, and the Malay chiefs were as ready to follow Charles Johnson in his campaign against him as against any other enemy of the Government. All the stories about his mysterious influence were all nonsense, and had no effect on the minds of the Sarawak people.
Some of the biographers of Sir James Brooke have fallen into the error of supposing that Sarawak was abandoned by the English Government during these perilous years. This, as I have already shown, was not so, for immediately after the Chinese insurrection, both Lord Palmerston and Lord Clarendon offered a Protectorate, but this offer was refused, except under conditions difficult for the British Government to accept. A naval station placed within Sarawak territory was also proposed; this likewise was rejected. Therefore, it must be confessed, the charge of entirely abandoning Sarawak was not well founded, as the refusal to accept British protection tied the hands of Ministers. The British Government went as far as they thought they could safely go, but, as I have already remarked, the Rajah did not feel satisfied with a bare Protectorate, as he mistrusted their sincerity.
On my way home from Brunei to England, early in 1860, I stopped at Singapore, and falling in there with Charles Grant, who had come over to recruit an English crew for a small gunboat, I heard of all that had been going on in the Rajah’s territories. I resolved to go over to Sarawak to judge of the situation for myself, so as to be able to carry home the latest news to Sir James Brooke. All real danger was now past. The energy and courage of the Rajah’s nephew, Charles Johnson, the present Rajah, had triumphed over all difficulties, and the coast as far as the Rejang was completely tranquil. It is easy to be wise after the event, but I did not then believe, nor do I believe now, that the Sarawak Malays were in any way affected by the plottings of the Datu Haji or of Sherif Musahor. They were afraid of some assassinations of foreigners until the former chief was banished the country, but on my arrival, in March 1860, I found them as sound and as loyal as ever they had been. If they had not been so, there was nothing to prevent them expelling every European from the country. They were all unanimous in their praise of the manner in which Charles Johnson had met the danger and crushed it.
Things were indeed now about to assume a brighter aspect. The same generous lady who had paid off the debt due to the Borneo Company found the money to buy a steamer, and with a steamer the stability of Sarawak would be finally established. The Rajah visited Glasgow to look out for a suitable one, and soon selected the Rainbow, for so he christened her, as the emblem of hope. Arriving in England shortly after this purchase, I went down to Scotland with my old chief to see the steamer start. There was no more despondency. He would nail his colours to the mast. In fact, the presence of the steamer on the coast as the property of the Sarawak Government closed the period of alarms, of plots and troubles, and since then I do not believe there has been a single dangerous conspiracy to check the progress of this little kingdom. But before the Rainbow arrived on the coast there was to be one more difficulty.
When Johnson drove Sherif Musahor out of the districts subject to Sarawak, he first fled to Muka, and then proceeded to Brunei and Labuan. His stories did not influence the Sultan, who knew the man, and was well persuaded that he had instigated the murder of Fox and Steele. Indeed, before I left Brunei, he had confided to me his suspicions. But the Sultan was still angry with the action of Sarawak, which had treated his sovereign rights with great contempt, so he encouraged the fugitive to proceed to Labuan and lay his complaints before Governor Edwardes, who was known to be hostile both to Sir James Brooke and his rising raj. This led to an interchange of views between the Governor and the Sultan, in which I fear the former promised to use all his influence to lower the position of His Highness’s great feudatory, and he sent for a ship of war to carry out his intentions. Unfortunately, he obtained an Indian steamer, the Victoria, instead of one of Her Majesty’s navy. No naval officer would have countenanced his proceedings.
Early in 1860, Captain Brooke returned to Sarawak and took over the administration of the Government, and I am persuaded he had the firm intention of living at peace with his neighbours, but he found that the high-handed proceedings of the previous year had been so deeply resented that the Governor of Muka, Pangeran Dipa, son of the murdered chief, had ordered all the Sarawak trading vessels to leave his district, and having fortified the entrance to the Muka River, awaited the effect of Sherif Musahor’s appeal to the Acting Consul-General.