A week after our return to Kuching, the Rajah and I had the great pleasure of welcoming to Sarawak our eldest son. An experienced English nurse had brought him out, and I remember so well the mail-boat arriving late in the afternoon, when from the verandah I saw through my glasses a short European lady, in white, carrying in her arms a baby in a blue sash. I am sorry to say that the salute from the guns of the Fort annoyed him exceedingly, and he was brought yelling and screaming to the landing-place, and it took some time before we could soothe his shattered nerves, unaccustomed as he was to such honours. The next day, all the chiefs’ wives, Datu Isa heading the contingent, and nearly all the women in Kuching, came to see the boy. He was very good with them, and appeared to understand that they were his true friends. It is a real happiness to me to know that the affection which he showed these people at the beginning of his life has lasted all through these years. I was not destined to remain long in peace at Kuching, for the Rajah was always full of work in his schemes for the advancement of his country. Many requests came to him from chiefs of rivers beyond our territory, begging to be allowed to become his subjects, in order to be placed under the protection of his Government. It would perhaps be as well just now to refer to the map of Sarawak. When the first Rajah began to reign, Sarawak consisted of the territory stretching between Cape Datu to the Sadong River. The maladministration of the Sultan of Brunei’s agents in the rivers of the Rejang, Muka, and Bintulu forced the people of these districts to seek for better government. This, they found, so to speak, at their very doors. In the space of fifteen years, these rivers were annexed to the Sarawak Government, at the request of the inhabitants, so that when the present Rajah first inherited the country from his uncle it extended as far as the Bintulu River. Turning again to the map, it will be seen that the rivers of Baram, Trusan, Lawas, and Limbang now also form part of the Rajah’s territory, but in the days of which I write the Baram River still belonged to the Sultan of Brunei, although the people were discontented under his rule. [Illustration: THE AUTHOR AND IMA, MORNING ROOM AT ASTANA, KUCHING]