Part 8

The rice field, the coconut palm and the river provide the Malay with an easy living, supplemented in the past by the proceeds of occasional piracy. He was not likely to be industrious so long as his property was liable to be seized at any moment by his rulers or their deputies. The Malay, as we find him all over the East India Islands, will hunt, fish, sail a boat or fight with considerable energy and skill, but he takes ordinary life in an easy fashion. He has no desire for the business of money-making and prefers to live in his simple fashion in his own homestead or _kampong_. Let us look at some of these native houses. They are 28 all raised above the ground on piles, and usually have a kind of verandah on one side; the interior is dark, as the native 29 is not fond of windows. We notice the bamboo and the coconut palm near every house and shall probably come on the stream not very far away. This is the real Malaya: the aspect of the towns is very different. Here we find streets of houses and shops, but these are largely given up to the natives of India or China, as we may guess from the signboards in the picture before us. 30 Here, on the other hand, we see the typical Malay, in his 31 national costume, the bright coloured _sarong_ or petticoat which is worn both by men and women, with a light jacket of 32 some kind to complete the dress. The Malays are Mohammedans, though not perhaps of a very rigid type. Here we see the new 33 mosque at Kuala Lumpur, fit to stand side by side with a palace; but the simple thatched or tiled buildings which we find 34 everywhere in the villages seem to agree better with our pictures of ordinary Malay life.

Though the Malay is largely occupied in agriculture, yet he has taken only a small share in the most important of recent movements, the artificial cultivation of rubber. All along the railway, outside the rice swamps, we find our view shut in by the tall trees of the forest. Here is a glimpse where the forest 35 has been thinned out a little, and here again is a corner 36 of the jungle showing the dense growth of fern and creeper. The constant rainfall and high temperature which give us the jungle have been found to be well suited to the growth of the Brazilian rubber tree. So here and there from the train we catch sight of a great clearing, with perhaps the young rubber trees growing 37 amid the roots and fallen trunks of the older forest. Or 38 again we pass a plantation in a more advanced stage; and if we pay the planter a visit we may see the coolies tapping the trees by slicing the bark, and collecting the milky latex 39 which when coagulated and smoked becomes rubber as we know it. The planter is English, perhaps from Ceylon; the coolies who 40 cluster round the bungalow to receive their pay are probably Tamils from India, since the Malay, though useful in the rough work of clearing to which he is accustomed, does not take readily to the steady work of cultivation.

Clearing, planting and growing the trees is a slow process, and the progress of Malaya would have been far from rapid if it had been based on agriculture alone. The money needed for roads and railways came from another source. When we intervened, we found the Chinese coolie already in occupation, and a considerable traffic in Chinese-owned vessels along the coast to Singapore. The cause of this traffic was tin. Tin ore is everywhere in the Peninsula, though it is mined chiefly in the alluvial areas at the foot of the hills. Some of the mining is still very primitive and is carried on by groups of Chinese who work with little capital but manage to make a profit none the less. But in many places modern machinery has been introduced; the steam pump has replaced the chain and bucket of the Chinese, while hydraulic sluicing and other up-to-date methods of mining are becoming 41 common. We often come on a whole valley, looking like a huge 42 quarry, turned upside down and desolated in the search for tin. Everywhere we notice the busy Chinese coolie, in his curious sun hat, and in the distance we may catch sight of the barracks where he lives. The ore is dug out and washed, and then for the most part sent to Singapore to be smelted and reduced to the shape in which it reaches our own country. Nearly half the world’s supply of tin comes from this narrow strip of country; and we may say that Malaya has been built up on tin, though now rubber is rapidly overtaking it in value. The two together constitute over nine-tenths of the total exports of the Federated States and provide a large revenue for the Government to spend on improvements.

The miner and artisan is nearly always a Chinese, so that at the present time the Chinese in the Federated States actually outnumber the natives. If we add the Indian coolies to the Chinese, we find that out of a total population of about a million, three-fifths are of foreign origin. This is how tin and rubber are translated into terms of population. Outside the Federated States we do not find the same proportions in the population, though the geographical conditions are of much the same kind. There is the same rice cultivation in the coast plains; the same plantations of coconuts and rubber, though on a smaller scale.

Trengganu has a considerable textile industry, while Kelantan exports _sarongs_ to the neighbouring states. Tin also is everywhere, and some gold; while Europeans are already mining, prospecting and planting. The population of Kelantan is almost entirely Malay, and the native element is stronger than the Chinese all down the east coast. The whole region is rather more primitive than the west side; the palace of the Sultan of 43 Kelantan, with its curious wooden palisade and guard of spearmen, looks distinctly old-fashioned.

In short, eastern Malaya has been rather out of the world in the past. The coast is difficult of access; the river mouths are blocked with sandbars, and there is a continuous line of surf in the months when the Northeast Monsoon is blowing. It lies, too, out of the main track of shipping; so that we have a great contrast to the sheltered waters of the Straits of Malacca, and it is only natural that the country behind should be slower to develop.

The most backward part is naturally the pathless jungle on the mountains of the interior, which is still given up to 44 wild game and to the Sakai, naked savages living in rough forest-shelters and armed with the blowpipe and poisoned dart. These represent the lowest grade among the people of the Peninsula. But development has begun in the east and the result will be a change in the face of the country such as we have seen in the west, brought about by the Chinese and Indians of the mine and plantation, aided by European and Chinese capital, and working under sound administration.

When we turn northwards from Singapore, on the way to China, we (2) are entering a vast enclosed sea, cut off from the main Pacific by a string of islands almost continuous for fifteen hundred miles. In the northern part of this barrier there are a few narrow passages; in the south the sea is shut in by the unbroken barrier of the coast of Borneo. Some idea of the size of Borneo, which is the largest island in the Malay Archipelago, can be obtained if we compare it with our own islands, mapped on the 45 same scale. We shall find that Borneo can contain not only the lands of the British Islands but a large part of the surrounding seas and channels as well. The south and southeastern part of this great island belongs to Holland, so that our visit will be limited to the northern end; but even in this corner we find a country as large as Ireland.

After a voyage of seven hundred miles across the southern end of this enclosed sea, we are approaching the small island of Labuan, which lies across the mouth of a broad inlet in the larger island. In the latter part of our voyage we have sighted land to the southeast, but this is not our destination, as it is not British territory, though as regards foreign relations under our protection. This land is the native state of Sarawak, which is ruled autocratically by an Englishman, Sir Charles Brooke. The origin of this State is one of the romances of the Pacific. Seventy years ago James Brooke, uncle of the present ruler, made a voyage through the South China Sea. He was specially attracted by Borneo and saw that it might be wealthy and prosperous if only it could be reclaimed from the misgovernment and barbarism of its native rulers. The chance soon came to put his theories to the test. Sarawak, then nominally part of the Sultanate of Brunei, was in a state of rebellion, owing to the misrule of a local chief. Brooke, with the crew of his yacht, helped the Rajah Muda, Hassim, uncle of the Sultan of Brunei, to restore order; and as a reward was made governor of Sarawak, in 1841. Thus the younger son of an Indian Civil Servant became in a moment an Eastern Potentate. Once established, Sir James Brooke, or Rajah Brooke as he is better known to history, not only kept good order in his own district but joined with the British navy in the suppression of piracy in the neighbouring seas. As Brunei decayed, Sarawak grew stronger. Its territory was enlarged from time to time and its prosperity has proved the benefit derived by the native inhabitants from strong and firm control.

An island rather larger than Guernsey, Labuan is the only British territory, as opposed to a Protectorate, which we shall find in this region. Rounding a headland we turn northwards into a broad and deep inlet, and come to anchor opposite a small town of white houses with red roofs and a background of low hills; this is Victoria, the capital and only town. We may have time to travel by the light railway to the coal mines at the other end of the island, but we shall find nothing else to detain us, as the country is mostly occupied by swamps and decayed villages. The harbour and the coal: these two things explain why Labuan is now a British Possession. Though it had been, for a short time in the eighteenth century, a station of the East India Company, it was unoccupied and seemingly of little value when we acquired it from the Sultan of Brunei in 1846; but we looked to its position on the flank of the great route to China, with its excellent harbour and supplies of coal. It was thought by some that the island would become a smaller Singapore, a port of call for shipping and a collecting centre for the whole mainland of Borneo. Labuan started with great expectations; its history has been a series of disappointments. The coal business failed from the first, while the transit trade did not develop, and the reason is not far to seek. In spite of the great natural resources of Borneo, there could be no progress in trade until piracy and head-hunting had been suppressed and some form of settled government introduced. Now that this has been accomplished and the country is prospering and developing, the mainland has its own seaports from which the goods are shipped direct to Singapore or Hongkong, so that Labuan derives no benefit.

Politically Labuan has had a varied career. In 1848, it was made a Crown Colony, Sir James Brooke being the first Governor; later it was handed over to the North Borneo Company to administer for a time; and since 1907 it has been annexed to the Straits Settlements. It has been eclipsed completely by its greater neighbour.

If we cross the wide bay between the island and the mainland, we shall get a glimpse of past history, and better appreciate the reason for the failure of Labuan. At the southeast corner of the bay we enter the Brunei river. The forest comes right down to the river bank, and the trees appear to be growing in the water, with a tangle of interlaced roots showing above the surface; we are passing a swamp of mangroves, or _bakau_, as the natives call the tree. Then the land begins to rise in low hills covered still with forest, and the mangrove gives way to the coconut palm. We pass native canoes with their double rows of paddles, and here and there on the bank a group of native houses among the palms. Finally we round a sharp bend in the river and come upon the 46 old native town of Brunei. It is a kind of eastern Venice, with its houses built on piles driven into the mud, and its 47 streets all waterways. Here is one of these streets. In Brunei, as all over Borneo, the bamboo, the palm and the creeping rattan provide the builder with material free of charge for posts, flooring, roofs and lashings--for the houses are tied, not nailed together. There is fish in abundance in the river, and we pass a fleet of market boats, with women in large sun hats, bringing 48 the catch for sale in the town; while in the forest all round there is fruit to be had for the picking. Nature has supplied the Malay with most of his necessaries at his very door.

Brunei has distinctly an air of decay. Centuries ago it was a large city, the capital of a kingdom. It gave its name to the whole island and its rulers extended their sway across the neighbouring seas. Early voyagers from Europe seem to have been much impressed by its barbaric magnificence. Now, all that remains of a past empire is a small corner of territory, with little trade or revenue, and ruled in name only by a petty chief. Most of the territory shown on the old maps has been ceded to the British North Borneo Company or to Sarawak. One local industry of some importance Brunei still possesses; this is the working of brass, particularly of brass gongs, which still pass as a kind of currency in the interior. We can visit a whole village of 49 brassworkers, on a creek close by, and see them working in the open air with primitive bellows made of bamboo, and producing castings of old-fashioned design. This is merely a survival; internal decay and attacks from outside have left Brunei only a shadow of its former power. The trade with China and the Malay Archipelago, which contributed to its former power, was destroyed by the attacks of the fierce pirates from the islands to the north; and British influence came too late to save the kingdom from its own internal weakness; though, under the guidance of British officials, and by the help of British capital, the fragment which remains seems likely to recover some of its prosperity.

Let us turn from Borneo of the past to Borneo of the future. We are going to make a voyage round the territory of the British North Borneo Company. Our trip will be limited to the coast districts, as much of the interior is difficult to reach and indeed not yet explored. First let us see what the map can tell us about the country as a whole.

The Company’s territory is in the form of a rough quadrilateral, 50 with a coastline irregular and deeply indented by the sea. Inland, but nearer to the west coast than the east, stretches a long backbone of mountains; so that the rivers on the east side are longer and the lowlands broader and flatter than on the west. The Equator cuts Borneo almost in the middle, and the whole island is truly tropical, though there are great differences between the highlands and the lowlands. The lowlands are hot all the year round, though the temperature is modified by the rain and dense vegetation and the nearness of the sea; so that the climate does not show the extremes of heat and the great variation which we find in the dry region of Northwest India, much further away from the Equator. Again, there are not two strongly marked wet and dry seasons; rain falls more or less in every month of the year, though spring and autumn are as a rule the wettest seasons. A total annual fall of from ninety to two hundred inches reminds us of the wetter parts of India and the Malay Peninsula, and combined with unvarying heat does not suggest a climate particularly adapted to occupation by the white man. In spite of this drawback the country is in course of development by British capital and under British direction. As an estate it is increasing in value every year. We will now try to see something of its products and people.

Seventy or eighty miles north of Labuan we enter another great bay, with a small island at the entrance; the bay and island of Gaya. On the south side of this bay is the town of Jesselton, the western capital of the Territory and the terminus of the only existing railway. Behind the town is hilly country, and as we approach we may see in the distance, so far as clouds permit, the great bulk of Mount Kinabalu, the highest part of the long mountain chain of the interior. At Jesselton we find European sports in progress and a mixed crowd is gathered: natives of the coast region, largely of Malay blood, Sikhs and Pathans of the Constabulary, with a few Chinese and the white officials. In the town are the Malay houses built over the water, and near them a row of Chinese shops; on the slopes above we see the 51 barracks, with the Constabulary at drill, and a few European residences, with Government House overlooking all. At Jesselton we have a picture in little of the conditions of the coast districts.

Before exploring inland we will borrow the Government launch for a short trip up the coast to Usikaan Bay. Here is a fine 52 portrait of our skipper. He is a typical coastman; his mother a native of Brunei, his father from Sarawak. He is a Mohammedan, like most of the coastmen, and is full of the lore and legend of the island. We land at a little pier and enter a shed, which is the Custom House. There is no sign of inhabitants, as the building is used only when the local steamer calls to collect the up-country produce. We have come here to look at the scenery, not the people, so we climb the hill above the bay, from which we can look down on the Abai river, flowing out beyond the next headland. It is a typical Borneo river. On both banks is the usual tropical swamp, and all around us is tropical vegetation. Here we can see the wonderful Pitcher Plant of these regions, 53 though the finest specimens are to be found further inland towards Mount Kinabalu. Turning away from the sea we have a view of the long ridge of Kinabalu, with the upper part of 54 the Abai river in the foreground. From this outlook we can gain a very fair idea of the character of tropical Borneo.

So far we have kept to the outer edge of the island; the railway from Jesselton will carry us inland, though not very far, as it runs on the whole parallel to the coast. The inland terminus of the line is at Tenom, east of Brunei Bay and behind the coast range of mountains. Here, too, native sports are in progress, but they are a much more important business than at Jesselton; they are announced months beforehand and provide a common meeting-place for the many native tribes of the interior. The contests are also especially fitted to the tastes and occupations of the natives, so that we may learn much from them. The raft 55 race is one of the most popular, as the rivers are the only means of traffic in the interior and the natives are skilled in handling every form of river craft. Even more interesting to 56 us is the shooting match with the _sumpitan_, the long blowpipe with poisoned darts which in this region takes the place of the bow and arrow. Here we find this formidable weapon put to a harmless use in shooting at the running deer; it is a kind of native Bisley. The crowds of spectators show us every type of native face and dress. Here is a group of Muruts with 57 _sumpitans_, and here are some visitors, Sea Dyaks from 58 Sarawak, whose name is associated with piracy and head-hunting. The Muruts seem to be the aborigines of this part of the interior; they are unlike the coast people in appearance and they are pagans, not Mohammedans; but they share with the Sea Dyaks their liking for head-hunting, and would soon revive the practice were British control removed.

In the neighbourhood of the railway we begin to find evidence of the progress of Borneo. One of the most successful crops is tobacco. Before it can be planted there is much work to be done. The jungle must first be attacked and rough roads driven through with ditches at the side for drainage in the heavy rains. Here we see the work of clearing in progress. Then wide spaces must be 59 prepared for planting, and at length we get our crop. The leaves 60 are then picked by coolies and carried in curious baskets to the drying and fermenting sheds for further treatment before they become the tobacco leaf of commerce.

We will now return to Jesselton and resume our voyage. A short way up the coast we leave the steamer and take to a boat; we are going up a small river to attend a _tanu_ or local market, in order to see something more of native life. We call on the District Officer at his house and accompany him in his barge of state to the market. Here a crowd of natives waits for the 61 hoisting of a little flag, the signal that they may begin their bargaining. They have brought down the produce of the interior, resins, gums and tobacco, to sell to the Chinese dealers; in return their favourite purchase is brass. There is also a great buying and selling of fish and fruit. Here we see a native 62 woman of the hill tribes carrying a large crate and wearing great coils of brass wire round her waist. The husband stands by and looks on, as is usual here, where the women do most of the heavy work.

Once more we board the steamer, and after touching at Kudat, a fine harbour in the great bay at the north end of the island, turn southward towards Sandakan, the capital of the Territory, where we shall end our voyage. On the deck of the little vessel is a crowd of Chinese coolies. The Chinese are the real workers on all the coasts of North Borneo, just as we found them in the Malay Peninsula. We reach Sandakan, which stands on a 63 splendid bay running fifteen miles up into the land. The entrance is only two miles wide, so that the bay is almost landlocked. Down at the water’s edge is the native town, with many of the houses built on piles; here too is the Chinese quarter, and scattered about further up a wooded slope are the houses of the Europeans. All round the sides of the harbour are smaller native villages.

Sandakan will probably in the future become an important commercial seaport, especially in view of its position on the route between Australia and China. It already boasts a shipbuilding and engineering yard, and a cutch factory which sends its products for tanning all over the world. Here also we may notice timber being floated down in great rafts for export, especially to China. Not far away up the river is one of the oldest rubber estates on the island. Borneo produces many kinds of plants giving rubber or gutta, but it has been found that the Para rubber tree of Brazil grows well, and there is a great future for its cultivation here as in the Malay Peninsula.