During their slow passage down the river, a Malay who was accustomed to trade with them, overtook them in a canoe, and actually induced them to permit him to pass, under the plea that his wife and children lived at a place called Batu Kawa, eight miles above the town, and would be frightened if they heard so many men passing, and he not there to reassure them; he pulled down as fast as he could till he reached the town of Kuching, and going straight to his relative, a Malay trader of the name of Gapur, who was a trustworthy and brave man, told him the story, but he said, “Don’t go and tell the chiefs or the rajah such a tissue of absurdities;” yet he went himself over to the bandhar and informed him; but the datu’s answer was, “The rajah is unwell, we have heard similar reports for the last twenty years; don’t go and bother him about it; I will tell him what your relative says in the morning.” This great security was caused by the universal belief that the Chinese could not commit so great a folly as to attempt to seize the government of the country, as they did not number above 4,000, while, at that time, the Malays and Dayaks, within the Sarawak territories, amounted to 200,000. But at midnight the squadron of Chinese boats pulled silently through the town, and dividing into two bodies, the smaller number entered Suñgei Bedil, the little stream above the government house, while the larger continued its course to the landing-place of the fort, to endeavour to surprise the houses of Mr. Crookshank, the police magistrate, and Mr. Middleton, the constable, while a large party was told off to attack the stockades. The government house was situated on a little grassy hill, surrounded by small, but pretty cottages, in which visitors were lodged. The Chinese landing on the banks of the stream just above a house in which I used to reside, marched to the attack in a body of about a hundred, and passing by an upper cottage, made an assault on the front and back of the long government house, the sole inhabitants of which were the rajah and a European servant. They did not surround the house, as their trembling hearts made them fear to separate into small bodies, because the opinion was rife among them that the rajah was a man brave, active, skilled in the use of weapons, and not to be overcome except by means of numbers.