To the eastward lies the rivers of Towsan* Abia (so called from the meeting of many rivers in the Sooloo language), Kinabatangan, Talasam, Soobapoocull, and several others at the eastern point of Borneo, called Unsang; this part of the coast has few or no inhabitants. It is reported that there is gold-dust sifted out of the rivers of Unsang, and the inhabitants who reside on the banks of the rivers Kinabatangan and Talasam find some gold which is washed down from the mountains in the time of the freshes. This part of the coast is clear from banks, and has regular soundings; and I have seen forty head of fine lissang straying along the beach near the mouths of these rivers.

From the island of Tambasan, at the north part of the point of Unsang, you have a view of the mountains Becha Becha and Banga-oo, being part of the Tawee Tawee's, which form the southern extremity of the Sooloo Archipelago, continuing in a chain to the north-east to Basseelan, and from Sooloo another chain from east to west. The situation, produce, &c., of these islands I shall leave to the geographical descriptions. The pearl fishery is their chief value.

Soog or Sooloo, the town of the same name, in latitude 60° N., where the Sultan has his residence. His dominions are on Borneo and the islands which form the archipelago. The road of Sooloo is pretty secure in the ruling monsoons, and is only exposed from west to north-west at the changing of the seasons: I have seldom or ever seen it continue to blow hard long.

Toolyan, lying at the east end of the island, is a fine secure bay for vessels riding in both monsoons.

Your residence at Sooloo, gentlemen, no doubt has given you a sufficient knowledge of the general character of this nation, also of their customs, manners, trade, produce, the nature of the clime, &c., which must render any detail of that kind unnecessary at present; not but what I shall be particular in my geographical description, from my long experience.

Mindanoe, at the north and north-east part, belonging to the Spaniards, down to Samboanga fort, at the south-west part, where they have about two hundred regulars for its defence; and although this garrison is supported at the yearly expense of twenty-five thousand dollars, it renders little or no revenue to the king, nor has it any sort of trade or produce to afford a tolerable livelihood to any other than the governor and chief military officer (who is a major), with the advantage he has of paying and supplying the troops with necessaries.

Mindanoe, the town so called, lies about three leagues up the river Salangan, situated at the southern part of the bay of Tuboe, in latitude 7° 12' N., having the island of Bangaout lying before its mouth, about six or seven miles to the westward. This place is *Towsan, I was told, means channel of communication.

the residence of the Sultan, and the late Sultan (Pakee) resigned his authority to a younger brother, who is now in the government, though he is still much respected, and nothing done without his consent. When he was at Sooloo in the year 1770, he seemed very well pleased with our design of settling in those parts, and declared himself much attached to the English, and wished much that they might find his country capable of giving them encouragement to fix there, and have an opportunity of making himself useful to them.

As for its trade, as no foreigners go that way, they get the few things they want from Sooloo at very high prices, and give their wax, rice, and gold in exchange, which are the chief commodities of the country. Slaves may be had at low prices there : those are chiefly Bisayors (inhabitants of the Philippines) generally taken by those people and the Islanos (another distinct race within the country), who have an independent Sultan of their own from that of Mindanoe: they carry on the piracies for all the rest, in the face of the very ports of the Spaniards. The Mindanoes and Soolooans would support an appearance of peace with the Spaniards, although they not only countenance but encourage them in their robberies, giving them a protection in their dominions and purchasing the plunder and captives, whilst there is no other method left to dispose of them; the Mindanoes have many fine galleys which they have taken from the Spaniards.

The bay of Sampinitin lies about two leagues to the northward of the river Salangan, which is the only secure place for a vessel of any burthen to lie in, having from nine to fifteen fathoms water. All the coast of Mindanoe to the southward is mostly steep, having no soundings but very near the shores.

Cagayan Sooloo lies in the latitude of 7° N., about twenty-five leagues to the eastward of Banguey Peak, a most pleasant little island, with some bullocks, goats, yams, fruit, &c. Water is very scarce, except at low water on the south-west side, right abreast of the town (which is also the best place for anchoring), where it may be had springing from under the rocks, and is supplied by a cavern which has a fine spring about sixty or eighty feet below the surface of the earth, lying near two miles within the country.

These are the places which I have been to during my stay in these parts, and I sent a general chart of my surveys to Bombay, and left one in the Secretary's office at Madras, to be forwarded to Europe. Through the hurry of business, I have not been able to finish one now to send by this opportunity, as I could wish, but must defer it till another opportunity; and I must do Mr. Dalrymple the justice to say, that what he has done from his own surveys and observations I found to be just, and may be depended

on; the rest, which he received from intelligence of Bahatol the pilot (who was alive when I arrived at Sooloo), Dattoo Saraphodin, and others, by being acquainted with the same, and able to converse with them, I have received the same accounts from them; and that Mr. Dalrymple has laid it down from his own surveys and their accounts where he had not an opportunity to go. I have made alterations and improvements on my surveys to those places which were laid down from information where Mr. Dalrymple had not been; there wants only the coast of Borneo from Abia to Keemanees, and the island of Palawan surveyed (the only places I have not visited in the Company's possessions), to render the navigation more safe and the survey complete. When this is accomplished I shall then be able to make a set of charts, with directions for the navigation of vessels, with the bearings and distances from place to place, the shoals and soundings, views of the land, and a large scale for the particular harbours, bays, &c. Should I be able to accomplish this to the approbation of my honourable employers and the satisfaction of navigators, I shall think my time well spent.

BALAMBANGAN, February 1, 1774.

JAMES BARTON.

N. B.—The spelling of proper names is according to Lieut. Barton's MS.

III.

SUBSTANCE OF A LETTER TO THE COURT OF DIRECTORS

From Mr. JOHN JESSE, dated July 20, 1775, at Borneo Proper. [A. DALRYMPLE'S "Oriental Repertory," vol. ii. pp. 1-8.]

As I am the first servant the Company ever had, or even European which for a number of years has visited this part of the island of BORNEO, I have presumed to lay before you every, even the minutest particular, which has occurred to my knowledge worthy your observation, that you may be the better enabled to form a just idea of your connections here, and to judge with precision what measures may hereafter most readily effect the objects you have had in view by an establishment in this quarter.

The Chief and Council of Balambangan, in the beginning of the last year, addressed a letter to the State of Borneo, informing them

of being arrived at Balambangan, and wishes of entering into alliances with them. In consequence of this invitation an ambassador arrived from thence in June, and I had the honour of being appointed to return with him, to open an intercourse there, and to enter into such engagements as might appear most to the Company's advantage.

I arrived here in the month of August, and found them unanimous in their inclination to cultivate the friendship and alliance of the Honourable Company; in consequence thereof, I made it my first care to discover the motives which principally induced them thereto, that I might be the better enabled so to frame my treaty as to keep them dependent in such particulars they most essentially stood in need of, which I then found to be, and have since been confirmed therein, was protection from their piratical neighbours, the Soolos and Mindanaos, and others, who make continual depredations on their coast, by taking advantage of their natural timidity. To relieve them, therefore, in this particular, and to induce them the more readily to consent to my subsequent proposals, I stipulated by one of the articles that (if attacked) the Company should protect them, and having thus gratified them in their principal want, in return I demanded for the Company, agreeably to the tenor of my instructions, the exclusive trade of the pepper; as I well knew it was the grand object they wished to attain, and I therefore also made it my study, to be thoroughly acquainted with every particular relative thereto. I was informed the quantity that year was 4,000 peculs, cultivated solely by a colony of Chinese settled here, and sold to the junks at the rate of 172 Spanish dollars per pecul, in China-cloth called congongs, which, for want of any other specie, are become the standard for regulating the price of all commercial commodities at this port. Although I was well convinced it could never answer the Company's purpose to pay so high a price for the pepper, especially where the quantity was so small, I notwithstanding in the Treaty made a point of securing to them the exclusive trade of that article, to be paid for in merchandise at such rates as might indemnify them at present, in the inconvenience of the high price, to the end that it might divert the channel of the junk trade from this to Balambangan (their grand inducement for coming here. being thus removed), which, together with my having bound the State to oblige all their dependants to make plantations, whereby the quantity would not only be greatly increased, but from their having no other purchasers, the Company would be enabled to fix such prices as would give ample encouragement to the planters, and soon reimburse the expenses which were necessitated to be borne at the beginning of the undertaking; and the more so as, in consequence of their industry, becoming yearly richer, they would find our protection but the more indispensably necessary.

Things being fixed on this basis-the Englishman and Borneyan becoming thus mutually necessary to each other-I flattered myself the event might have produced a solid and real commercial advantage, as well to the nation as to the Company; and the more so as from the great probability of the hill people being soon induced also to plant, who, by receiving cloth as the price of their industry, would naturally increase the consumption and render our manufactures with them a necessary of life, these being by far the most numerous and the aborigines of the island. Another advantage accruing therefrom is, that having once connected these people in interest with the Company, and familiarized them to our customs, the inhabitants of the sea-coast would be unable (were they inclined) to obstruct or molest the prosecution of the Company's views. These were the motives which first induced me to secure to the Company, in the treaty with the Borneyans, the exclusive trade to the pepper, although at that time on seemingly disadvantageous terms. How far I may have acted with propriety remains with the Company to determine.

I now come to say something of the characteristics of the different sects of the inhabitants.

The Borneyans, who inhabit the sea-coast, are Mahometans, and, as they say, are originally an emigration from Jehore, but are ignorant of their chronology. They extended their dominions over these coasts: Palawan, Manilla, and other parts of the Philippines; and even Sooloo, as Mr. Dalrymple observes, was formerly a part of this empire. From these extensive conquests, and the unconnected traditions I have had from them, I am inclined to think they were originally a warlike people; but as most other empires, when arrived at a certain pitch of grandeur, have generally declined to nearly their original state, from a want of that vigorous and active government which is so essentially necessary in supporting all acquisitions obtained merely by force. of arms, so appears to have been the case with that of Borneo ; and I am the more convinced of it from that entire indolence and inactivity I found them immersed in on my arrival, being totally degenerated from that courage and enterprise which seems to have marked the character of their roving ancestors, and deprived of their influence in all their former dominions, situated to the northward of Borneo.

From what I have been led to say relative to this State, it may be seen they are enervated and unwarlike, added to which they seem to be envious of the private property of each other to a great degree. But, on the other hand, I have found them fair in their dealings; cool and deliberate in their resentments, even where the object is in their power; candid in their intentions; strangers to what we call the world, although not deficient in the innate faculty of the understanding, as they seem to have, in