PIRATES.
When we first lived at Sarawak, the coasts and the seas from Singapore
to China were infested with pirates. "It is in the Malay's nature," says
a Dutch writer, "to rove the seas in his prahu, as it is in the Arab to
wander with his steed on the sands of the desert." Before the English
and Dutch Governments exerted themselves to put down piracy in the
Eastern seas, there were communities of these Malays settled in various
parts of the coast of Borneo, who made it the business of their lives to
rob and destroy all the vessels they could meet with, either killing the
crews or reducing them to slavery. For this purpose they went out in
fleets of from ten to thirty war-boats or prahus. These boats were about
ninety feet long; they carried a large gun in the bow and three or four
lelahs, small brass guns, in each broadside, besides twenty or thirty
muskets. Each prahu was rowed by sixty or eighty oars in two tiers, and
carried from eighty to a hundred men. Over the rowers, and extending
the whole length of the vessel, was a light flat roof, made of split
bamboo, and covered with mats. This protected the ammunition and
provisions from rain, and served as a platform on which they mounted to
fight, from which they fired their muskets and hurled their spears.
These formidable boats skulked about in the sheltered bays of the coast,
at the season of the year when they knew that merchant-vessels would be
passing with rich cargoes for the ports of Singapore, Penang, or to and
from China. A scout-boat, with but few men in it, which would not excite
suspicion, went out to spy for sails. They did not generally attack
large or armed ships, although many a good-sized Dutch or English craft,
which had been becalmed or enticed by them into dangerous or shallow
water, was overpowered by their numbers. But it was usually the small
unarmed vessels they fell upon, with fearful yells, binding those they
did not kill, and burning the vessel after robbing it, to avoid
detection. While the south-west monsoon lasted, the pirates lurked about
in uninhabited creeks and bays until the trading season was over. But
when the north-east monsoon set in, they returned to their settlements,
often rich in booty, and with blood on their hands, only to rejoice over
the past, and prepare for next year's expedition. There are still some
nests of pirates in the north of Borneo, although of late the Spaniards
have done much to exterminate them. But when Sir James Brooke first
visited Sarawak, the nobles there, and their sultan at Bruni, used to
permit, nay, encourage, piratical raids against their own subjects at a
little distance, provided they shared in the profits of the expedition,
thus impoverishing the country they ruled, and putting a stop to all
native trade--a short-sighted and wicked policy. It took a good many
years of stern resistance on Sir James Brooke's part before the Bruni
nobles could be cured of their connivance of pirates, whether Malay or
Dyak.
The Dyaks of Sarebas and Sakarran, a brave and noble people, were taught
piracy by the Malays who dwelt among them. These Dyaks were always
head-hunters, and used to pull the oars in the Malay prahus for the sake
of the heads of the slain, which they alone cared for. But, in course of
time, the Dyaks became expert seamen. They built boats which they called
bangkongs, and went out with the Malays, devastating the coast and
killing Malays, Chinese, Dyaks, whoever they met with. The Dyak bangkong
draws very little water, and is both lighter and faster than the Malay
prahu; it is a hundred feet long, and nine or ten broad. Sixty or eighty
men with paddles make her skim through the water as swiftly as a London
race-boat. She moves without noise, and surprises her victims with
showers of spears at dead of night; neither can any vessel, except a
steamer, catch a Dyak bangkong, if the crew deem it necessary to fly.
These boats can be easily taken to pieces; for the planks, which extend
the whole length of the boat, are not fastened with nails, but lashed
together with rattans, and calked with bark, which swells when wet; so
that, if they wish to hide their retreat into the jungle, they can
quickly unlace their boats, carry them on their shoulders into the
woods, and put them together again when they want them. When we first
lived at Sarawak no merchant-boat dared go out of the river alone and
unarmed. We were constantly shocked with dreadful accounts of villages
on the coast, or boats at the entrance, being surprised, and men, women,
and children barbarously murdered by these wretches. I remember once a
boat being found with only three fingers of a man in it, and a bloody
mark at the side, where the heads of those in the boat had been cut off.
Sometimes the pirates would wait until they knew the men of a village
were away at their paddy farms, then they would fall suddenly upon the
defenceless old men, women, and children, kill some, make slaves of the
young ones, and rob the houses.
Sometimes, having destroyed a village and its inhabitants, they would
dress themselves in the clothes of the slain, and, proceeding to another
place, would call out to the women, "The Sarebas are coming, but, if you
bring down your valuables to us, we will defend you and your property."
And many fell into the snare, and were carried off. If they attacked a
house when the men were at home, it was by night. They pulled stealthily
up the river in their boats, and landing under cover of their shields,
crept under the long house where many families lived together. These
houses stand on high poles. The pirates then set fire to dry wood and a
quantity of chillies which they carried with them for the purpose. This
made a suffocating smoke, which hindered the inmates from coming out to
defend themselves. Then they cut down the posts of the house, which
fell, with all it contained, into their ruthless hands.
In the year 1849, the atrocities of the piratical Dyaks were so
frequent, that the rajah applied to the English Admiral in the straits
for some men-of-war to assist him in destroying them. Remonstrances and
threats had been tried again and again. The pirates would always promise
good behaviour for the future to avert a present danger; but they never
kept these promises when an opportunity offered for breaking them with
impunity. In consequence of Sir James Brooke's application, H.M.S.
_Albatross_, commanded by Captain Farquhar; H.M.'s sloop _Royalist_,
commander, Lieutenant Everest; and H.E.I.C.'s steamer _Nemesis_,
commander, Captain Wallage, were sent by Admiral Collyer to Sarawak.
Then the rajah had all his war-boats got ready to join the English
force. There was the _Lion King_, the _Royal Eagle_, the _Tiger_, the
_Big Snake_, the _Little Snake_, the _Frog_, the _Alligator_, and many
others belonging to the Datus, who, on occasions like these, are bound
to call on their servants, and a certain number of able-bodied men
living in their kampongs, to man and fight in their boats. This is their
service to the Government. The rajah supplies the whole force with rice
for the expedition, and a certain number of muskets. The English ships
were left, the _Albatross_ at Sarawak, and the _Royalist_ to guard the
entrance of the Batang Lupar River, into which the Sakarran and Sarebas
Rivers _débouche_; but their boats, and nearly all the officers,
accompanied the fleet, and the steamer _Nemesis_ went also. On the 24th
of July they left us, as many as eighteen Malay prahus, manned by from
twenty to seventy men in each, and decorated with flags and streamers
innumerable, of the brightest colours,--the Sarawak flag, a red and
black cross on a yellow ground, always at the stern. For the _Tiger_ I
made a flag, as it was Mr. Brereton's boat, with a tiger's head painted
on it, looking wonderfully ferocious. It was an exciting time, with
gongs and drums, Malay yells and English hurrahs; and our fervent
prayers for their safety and success accompanied them that night, as
they dropped down the river in gay procession. They were afterwards
joined by bangkongs of friendly Dyaks, three hundred men from Lundu,
eight hundred from Linga, some from Samarahan, Sadong, and various
places which had suffered from the pirates, and were anxious to assist
in giving them a lesson. We heard nothing of the fleet until the 2nd of
August, when I received a little note from the rajah, written in pencil,
on a scrap of paper, on the night of the 31st of July, and giving an
account of how they fell in with a great balla (war fleet) of Sarebas
and Sakarran pirates, consisting of one hundred and fifty bangkongs,
returning to their homes with plunder and captives in their boats. The
pirates found all the entrances of the river occupied by their enemies,
the English, Malay, and Dyak forces being placed in three detachments,
and the _Nemesis_ all ready to help whenever the attack began. The _Lion
King_ sent up a rocket when she espied the pirate fleet, to apprise the
rest. Then there was a dead silence, broken only by three strokes of a
gong, which called the pirates to a council of war. A few minutes
afterwards a fearful yell gave notice of their advance, and the fleet
approached in two divisions. But when they sighted the steamer they
became aware of the odds against them, and again called a council by
beat of gong. After another pause, a second yell of defiance showed they
had decided on giving battle. Then, in the dead of the night, ensued a
fearful scene. The pirates fought bravely, but could not withstand the
superior forces of their enemies. Their boats were upset by the paddles
of the steamer; they were hemmed in on every side, and five hundred men
were killed, sword in hand; while two thousand five hundred escaped to
the jungle. The boats were broken to pieces, or deserted on the beach by
their crews; and the morning light showed a sad spectacle of ruin and
defeat. Upwards of eighty prahus and bangkongs were captured, many from
sixty to eighty feet long, with nine or ten feet beam.
The English officers on that night offered prizes to all who should
bring in captives alive: but the pirates would take no quarter; in the
water they still fought without surrender, for they could not understand
a mercy they never accorded to their enemies. Consequently the prisoners
were very few, and the darkness of the night favoured escape.
The peninsula to which they fled could easily have been so surrounded by
the Dyak and Malay forces that not one man of that pirate fleet could
have left it alive. This blockade the Malays entreated the rajah to
make; but he refused, saying that he hoped they had already received a
sufficient lesson, and would return to their homes humbled and
corrected. He therefore ordered his fleet to proceed up the river, and
the pirates went back to Sarebas and Sakarran. This severe punishment
cured the Dyaks of those rivers once and for all of piracy, and was the
greatest blessing which could have been conferred on those fine tribes.
They allowed forts to be built on their rivers, and submitted to English
residents, who ruled them with the counsel of their own chiefs. In 1857,
when the Chinese rebelled and burnt the town of Kuching, these Dyaks
sent their warriors to assist the Sarawak Government; in doing so they
joined other tribes whose hereditary enemies they had been for many
generations. Some of us felt anxious when we saw the fleet of Sakarrans
and Balows lying side by side at the Linga Fort; but they all kept
their good faith, and in fighting a common enemy became friends for
evermore.
In 1852 Sir James Brooke placed Mr. Brereton in a fort at Sakarran,
built at the entrance of the river. He threw himself heartily into the
work of improving the people, and gained a good influence over many. One
of the most important chiefs, Gassim, attached himself to him, and even
gave up the practice of head-taking to please him.
There were certain paddy farms in the country which by ancient custom
could only be cultivated by heroes who had taken many heads. One of
Gassim's people, however, who had never taken a single head, presumed to
clear and plant some of this ground; whereupon the other chiefs
complained, and one sent a message to Gassim, that if he did not put a
stop to this breach of law, he would fight him. Gassim answered that he
was ready to fight with swords if necessary, but first he begged a
conference with all the other chiefs to discuss the matter. To this they
agreed, and by the force of his eloquence and the justice of his cause,
Gassim proved to them that the old custom was bad and ought to be
repealed. About that time Brereton brought Gassim and a number of his
people to visit Kuching, and the chief breakfasted with us. When all the
school-children came in to prayers--for the church was not yet
finished--and Gassim heard them repeat the responses and say the Lord's
Prayer, he was delighted, and said that he and his people would also
like to be Christians.
We used to like the Sakarrans much better than their neighbours, the
Sarebas, in those days. They were fine, tall, handsome men, with
straight noses and pleasant manners. The Sarebas were coarser-looking
people, who disfigured themselves by wearing brass rings all along the
lobes of their ears: the one at the bottom was as large as a
curtain-ring in circumference, though of slender make; it lay on the
chest, and by its weight dragged a great hole in the ear. These rings
were inserted when the children were quite young, and pulled their
little faces out of shape, giving an uncomfortable expression. Sarawak
Malays always said, "A Sakarran Dyak may be trusted, but a Sarebas is
deceitful." It is a curious fact, however, that the Sakarrans, with all
their fair words and sleek prepossessing looks, did not embrace the
gospel as the Sarebas did. The Rev. Walter Chambers lived at Sakarran
for some time, but gathered no converts. He then settled himself among
the Balows of the Batang Lupar and Linga, and when there was a community
of Christians from these rivers, at Banting, where Mr. Chambers had
built his church and house, a Sarebas chief, Buda by name, the son of a
notorious old pirate, happened to meet some of these Christian Dyaks,
and came himself to be taught. He brought his wife, sister, and child.
They walked upwards of eighty miles, partly through the mud of the
sea-shore, carrying their mats and cooking-pots with them, and
established themselves in the mission-house, where they were kindly
welcomed, and stayed six weeks, during which time they were so diligent
that they learnt to read and made some progress in writing. This was in
the rainy season, when all farming operations are in abeyance. The next
year they returned at the same time, but, meanwhile, they had not been
idle, but had taught all they knew to their countrymen. Shortly
afterwards Buda was made a catechist, and he excited so much interest,
that in 1867 Mr. Chambers baptized one hundred and eighty of these
people, who were once the most dangerous enemies of the English and the
most notorious pirates of Borneo. Then Buda proceeded to the village of
Seruai, and Mr. Chambers had soon to visit there, for the people were so
earnest they would scarcely let him sleep, nor seemed to require any
sleep themselves, but day and night learnt the hymns and catechism,
which they must know by heart to be baptized. Nearly two hundred were
baptized on the Kryan River. A catechist had been placed there, called
Belabut. He married Buda's sister, who walked to Banting for
instruction. She had much influence over the women of the tribe, and Mr.
Chambers said it was delightful to hear her read "her beloved gospel"
with the correct pronunciation of an English lady.
The Christians of the Kryan did not keep the good news to themselves,
but proceeded to teach the next village of Sinambo. In these villages
there are now school-chapels, built by the Dyaks themselves. In 1873,
Mr. Chambers, who was then bishop, wrote: "These Sea Dyaks have made the
greatest advances in civilization and Christianity. Looking back even
five years, there is a great difference. They have abandoned
superstitious habits." "They no longer listen to the voices of birds to
tell them when to sow their seeds, undertake a journey, or build a
house; they never consult a manang[1] in sickness or difficulty; above
all, they set no store by the blackened skulls which used to hang from
their roofs, but which they have either buried or given away to any
people from a distance who cared for them, assuring them at the same
time that they 'were no use.'"
[Footnote 1: Heathen doctor.]
Thus we see what a just punishment and a fostering Government, added to
the sweet influences of Christianity, have done for these people; but it
took years of patience and faith to effect so great a change.
After the pirate fight of 1849, the evil disposed and turbulent, both of
the Sakarrans and Sarebas, found a leader in Rentab, a Sarebas chief. He
braved the Government for years. In 1852 his war-boats appeared above
the Sakarran Fort, and the two young Englishmen there, Mr. Brereton and
Mr. Lee, too confident in their strength, attacked the boats with a
small force. In this engagement Mr. Lee was killed, and Mr. Brereton
escaped with difficulty. Several expeditions were taken into the
interior against Rentab; but he was so clever, that even when Captain
Brooke battered his stronghold to pieces by having guns dragged up the
steep hill on which his fort was built, Rentab managed to escape, and
was never taken. His followers, however, fell away from him by degrees,
and there are now no pirates in those rivers.