hand-in-glove with the malcontents amongst the Saribas and Sadong Malays, and was the cause of the revolt in the Sadong, due to his connection the Bandar Kasim. He was at once sent to Singapore, not, however, to remain there for long; and he shortly afterwards got himself into further and more serious trouble. He had failed, but he knew others would shortly be active, and he trusted to them to retrieve his failure, and so prepared to join them directly they moved. Bayang, the principal chief of the Dayaks, who had joined him, was imprisoned. The discovery of this conspiracy, the murders of Steele and Fox, and the knowledge that other plots were certainly brewing naturally created great alarm amongst the English residents. No one felt safe, for none knew the actual extent of these plots, or could distinguish between friend and foe. The Government Officers were discouraged, for they felt that the confidence created by long years of labour, anxiety, and kindly intercourse between themselves and the natives was fast vanishing. Some of the piratical Dayaks, who were being slowly but surely weaned from their evil ways and induced to trade and plant, led astray by cunningly devised reports, retired again to their fastnesses in the interior and defied the Government; and it was feared that this disaffection might spread.[242] Sir Spenser St. John writes:— The gentlemen, to a man, stuck to their posts with firmness,[243] the second class lost all courage; while the Bishop and some of the missionaries left, the former taking home news that it was a Mahomedan plot, with the Datu Imaum (the rival Mahomedan Bishop) at the head of it—whereas the Datu Imaum showed himself, as ever, the true and faithful friend of the English[244]— and, we may add, true and faithful he remained for nearly fifty years afterwards.[245] The year of anxiety and careful watching closed without any further outbreaks, but early in 1860 came the final episode, which ended in the complete dispersion of conspiracies and conspirators.