To ruin Mr. Brooke's prestige with the Land-Dayaks, Malays, and Chinese, as their protector, a crafty scheme was devised by Makota, to which he induced the Rajah to grant his consent. He invited a party of 2500 Sea-Dayaks from Sekrang to ascend the Sarawak river and massacre the Land-Dayaks, Malays, and Chinese in the interior. They arrived at Kuching, and, with the addition of a number of Malays as guides, started up the river. But Brooke, highly incensed, retired to the _Royalist_, and at once prepared that vessel and the _Swift_ for action. This had the desired effect. Hasim was cowed; "he denied all knowledge of it; but the knowledge was no less certain, and the measure his own."[89] He threw the blame on Makota, and, yielding to Brooke's insistence, sent a messenger up river after the fleet to recall it,—a command that could not be disobeyed, as Brooke held command of the route by which they must return. Sulkily and resentfully did the Sekrang Dayaks return, without heads, and without plunder. And for Makota it was a case of the biter bit, as he had unwittingly enhanced Brooke's prestige. The oppressed people now learnt that Brooke was not only determined to protect them, but that he had the power to do it—a power greater than Makota's; and this strengthened his hands, for many who had wavered through doubt on this point and fear of Makota, now threw in their lot with him, as Makota was shortly to discover to his cost. "The very idea," wrote Brooke in his Journal, "of letting 2500 wild devils loose in the interior of the country is horrible. What object can the Malays[90] have in destroying their own country and people so wantonly? The Malays take part in these excursions, and thirty men joined the Sekrangs on the present occasion, and consequently they share the plunder, and share largely. Probably Muda Hasim would have twenty slaves (women and children), and these twenty being redeemed at the low rate of twenty reals each makes 400 reals, besides other plunder amounting to one or two hundred reals more. Inferior pangirans would, of course, take likewise."