18
LEIGH WRIGHT
marks for booty and slaves, along with other places such as Endau on the east coast of Malaya, and Jolo the seat of the sultan of Sulu in the archipelago to the southwest of Mindanao.
No wonder that 18th and 19th century accounts of Brunei were so uncomplimentary. It was by one account,5 "a nest of bandits". Sea captains were warned to keep well away from Brunei:6
The predatory and treacherous disposition of the inhabitants of the extensive coasts that encircle the great island of Borneo have now discouraged almost every European from venturing to trade there.
there is no inducement for a ship to touch there or at any other of the bays on the northwest or northeast coasts of Borneo, the natives being inhospitable and perfidious.
And the keen observer and writer Spencer B. St. John wrote of Brunei in 1860:7
The divisions among the nobles themselves prevent them ever uniting to regain an influence over their distant provinces, which one by one are falling from them. There is a poverty among these men which is almost inconceivable in a rich country, as whatever the amount obtained from the neighbouring villages, it can but support the idlers who throng round the chiefs.
Brunei contains at least 25,000 inhabitants, half of whom depend, directly or indirectly, on the nobles, and in their name carry on a system of plunder unintelligible in other countries. If the followers be sent to make a demand on a certain village, they will obtain double the amount for their own shares. If the inhabitants refuse to pay, their children are seized; and if their means are really exhausted, the little ones are carried off into slavery.
I knew a man, named Sirudin, who at one time brought over seventeen children obtained in that way from the people of Tutong, and this occurred during the spring of 1857. The parents laid their complaints before the sultan; but Sirudin had sold them off to the principal nobles, and no redress was to be had. The sultan pretended to be very angry with the man, but put the chief blame on the Pangeran de Gadong, who, he said, was beyond his power. The aborigines have often risen
18
LEIGH WRIGHT
marts for booty and slaves, along with other places such as Endau on the east coast of Malaya, and Jolo the seat of the sultan of Sulu in the archipelago to the southwest of Mindanao.
No wonder that 18th and 19th century accounts of Brunei were so uncomplimentary. It was by one account,5 "a nest of bandits". Sea captains were warned to keep well away from Brunei: 6
The predatory and treacherous disposition of the inhabitants of the extensive coasts that encircle the great island of Borneo have now discouraged almost every European from venturing to trade there.
+
there is no inducement for a ship to touch there or at any other of the bays on the northwest or northeast coasts of Borneo, the natives being inhospitable and perfidious.
And the keen observer and writer Spencer B. St. John wrote of Brunei in 1860:7
The divisions among the nobles themselves prevent them ever uniting to regain an influence over their distant provinces. which one by one are falling from them. There is a poverty among these men which is almost inconceivable in a rich country, as whatever the amount obtained from the neighbour- ing villages, it can but support the idlers who throng round the chiefs.
Brunei contains at least 25,000 inhabitants, half of whom depend, directly or indirectly, on the nobles, and in their name carry on a system of plunder unintelligible in other countries. If the followers be sent to make a demand on a certain village, they will obtain double the amount for their own shares. If the inhabitants refuse to pay, their children are seized; and if their means are really exhausted, the little ones are carried off into slavery.
I knew a man, named Sirudin, who at one time brought over seventeen children obtained in that way from the people of Tutong, and this occurred during the spring of 1857. The parents laid their complaints before the sultan; but Sirudin had sold them off to the principal nobles, and no redress was to be had. The sultan pretended to be very angry with the man, but put the chief blame on the pangeran de Gadong, who, he said, was beyond his power. The aborigines have often risen
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