Early in October, H.M.S. _Samarang_, Captain Sir Edward Belcher, and the H.E.I.C.'s steamer _Phlegethon_, arrived to convey to Bruni, Rajah Muda Hasim, his brothers, and their numerous families, retainers, slaves, and hangers-on. The Rajah himself went up in the _Samarang_. On approaching Bruni there were signs of hostility from four forts on Pulo Cheremin, which Pangiran Usup had frightened the Sultan into building, but the flag of Hasim reassured the Brunis. The exiles were well received. The Sultan declared he would listen to no other adviser than Hasim, and the people were in favour of him. Though Pangiran Usup had gained great influence over the Sultan he deemed it prudent to dissemble, and declared himself ready implicitly to obey Hasim, and as a proof of good faith at once dismantled the new forts on Hasim ordering him to do so. The poorer classes, who had heard of the peace and security enjoyed by the inhabitants of Sarawak, openly expressed their desire that the Rajah should remain and govern conjointly with Pangiran Muda Hasim. Labuan island, which the Sultan now offered the Rajah, was examined, and the Rajah considered it superior to Kuching for a settlement, as being in a more central and more commanding position.[126] In February, 1845, Captain Bethune of H.M.S. _Driver_, anchored in the Sarawak river, and brought a despatch from Lord Aberdeen appointing the Rajah confidential agent in Borneo to her Majesty, an appointment made mainly upon the Rajah's own suggestion that official recognition would go far to help him. He at once proceeded to Bruni in the _Driver_, bearing a letter from the Foreign Office to the Sultan in reply to his letters requesting assistance to suppress piracy; and Captain Bethune had been directed to select a suitable locality on the N.W. coast for the formation of a British settlement, whence the sea along the north and west coasts might be watched, and where there was coal suitable for a coaling station.