Twelve years later, a resident
could boast that for three years only one person had lost his life by
other than natural causes. How would American cities appear in
comparison with this poor Dyak and heathen metropolis? Well does Rajah
Brooke proudly ask, "Could such success spring from a narrow and sordid
policy?" Mrs. McDougall, the missionary's wife, says: "We have now a
beautiful church at Sarawak, and the bell calls us there to worship
every morning at six, and at five every evening. Neither is there
anything in this quiet, happy place to prevent our thus living in God's
presence."
Mrs. McDougall adds a story which shows the estimation in which the
natives hold their Rajah. "Pa Jenna paid me a visit at Sarawak. The
Rajah was then in England. But Pa Jenna, coming into my sitting-room,
immediately espied his picture hanging against the wall. I was much
struck with the expression of respect which both the face and attitude
of this untutored savage assumed as he stood before the picture. He
raised his handkerchief from his head, and, saluting the picture with a
bow, such as a Roman Catholic would make to his patron saint's altar,
whispered to himself, 'Our great Rajah.'" And this man was a reclaimed
pirate.
This reverential love of the natives is the one thing which does not
admit of a doubt.
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