A policy that both the Rajahs had advocated should be adopted towards Bruni. For many years, as we have seen, Sarawak had to contend with the opposing influence of Governors of Labuan adverse to her advancement, but in 1875 Mr. Ussher was appointed Governor, and he was not prepared to take for granted all the stories of Sarawak aggression and intimidation which were poured into his ears. He sought for independent testimony, inquired into matters himself, and was not disposed to gloss over the misdeeds of the Sultan and his pangirans, and to suppress all mention of these in his despatches home. Towards the end of his term of office Mr. Ussher wrote to the Rajah, "I have had an important interview to-day with Mr. Meade at the Colonial Office. The object in view was to ascertain the advisability of permitting you to acquire Baram. I ascertained that the objections against this step were reduced, firstly, to an idea that undue pressure was put upon the Sultan; secondly, that resident (!) traders, British, in that river would be damaged thereby. "I also ascertained that the Colonial Secretary here was not at all disposed to carry out the views obstructive of Sarawak advance, which have animated his predecessors; but that, on the contrary, he was disposed to allow you and the Sultan to arrive at your own terms, so long as the Sultan was a perfectly free agent in the matter. "In the course of a rather lengthy, and, I trust, not ineffective address on my part, I successfully combated these trivial and groundless objections, and exposed the fallacy of Sir Henry Bulwer's[311] and Mr. Pope Hennessy's views with regard to your dealings with the Sultan. I pointed out also the gross injustice and oppression of the Bruni rule in these territories, and expressed my firm conviction of the general desire on the part of the industrious and agricultural classes to pass under your settled and civilised rule. I demonstrated that there were _no_ resident British traders, either in Baram or elsewhere in these parts, whose interests could be imperilled. Further, that so long as you impose no restrictive export duties on native produce from the river, there was nothing whatever to prevent the sago, etc., coming to Labuan or anywhere else.