modern Eden, primitive in habits and numerically insignificant
; he has scarcely begun his battle with things
inanimate, or his struggle for existence as it is known
to us. At home we have man as in some sort the master
of Nature, but in the Bornean forests Nature still
reigns supreme. Here with us man wrests his sustenance
from her—there she is lavish in the bestowal of
gifts unsought.
The immediate future of an island larger in area than
Great Britain canndt fail to be of interest to political
thinkers, especially to those who belong to the “ scientific
frontier” school. Malay Government is weaker now
than it was even at the time Sir James Brooke received
Sarawak, and the aid of our own Government is now
being sought in favour of the cession of the whole of
Northern Borneo—from Gaya Bay to Sabuco—to a
public company! Unaided by England, Borneo seems
likely to suffer in two ways—either to be annexed by
the Government of Manilla, or else to fall into the
hands of the promoters of public companies. The Sulu
Archipelago has already thus lost its independence;
and the question which now suggests itself is, What
will England do with her foster-colony, Borneo the
Beautiful ?
Borneo offers to the student of nature an ever-interesting
field for research and study. The local government is
very peculiar and interesting. Every village of any
pretensions has its “ Orang Kaya,” or head man, and his
house is at the service of the passing stranger. In any
matter of dispute he may be referred to, and my own
experience of these petty rulers was on the whole very
satisfactory. I found them honest and just in their
advice, although at times a little grasping in their
bargains.
The ease with which food is obtained in such a tropical
land is of course inimical to any great exertion or progress
on the part of the natives. That most generous of all
food-giving plants, the Banana, is everywhere naturalised
in Borneo up to an altitude of 3000 feet. It fruits all the
year, its produce being to that of wheat as 133:1, and to
that of the potato as 44:1. With rice and a few esculent
roots, all easily grown, it gives a profusion of food at a
slight expenditure of labour—labour for the most part
performed by the women. The Malays of Borneo are
morally far inferior to the inland tribes ; and, wherever it
is possible to them, live in voluptuous ease.
Borneo is the home of the “ Orang-utan,” or “ wild
man of the woods,” an animal which, with its African
relative, the “ Gorilla,” has occupied the attention of so
many of the first thinkers of our time. Here, in its
native forests, this large man-like ape lives in the great
natural orchards, swinging itself from bough to bough
with its peculiarly long arms, building its platform or
nest of leafy branches, and eating its meal of fruit in peace.
“ Let any naturalist,” says a modern observer, “ who is
prejudiced against the Darwinian views go to the forests
of Borneo. Let him there watch from day to day this
strangely human form in all its various phases of exist