For these and many other reasons I think that gentlemen who govern native states should not marry, or if an exception be made in favour of the chief, certainly his subordinates, who are employed in out-stations where natives abound, should not be married. And this rule might well be applied to the officers sent to our North-Western frontier in India. Marriage immediately separates the governors from the governed. Ladies as a rule cannot be brought to understand that the natives can in any case be considered as equals, and are apt to despise them accordingly. With such ideas, how can bonds of sympathy exist between the rulers and the ruled? At that time, 1857, the Sago Rivers, north-east of the Rejang, were very much disturbed. Though there were some extenuating circumstances, the action of Sarawak was not altogether free from blame. A quarrel had arisen between two native chiefs, one the governor of the district of Muka Pangeran Nipa, and the other his cousin, Pangeran Matusin. The first act of the tragedy was that the latter dashed into the house of the former and murdered him and eleven of his women and children. The second was the driving out of Matusin and the slaughter of thirty-five of his friends and relations. Sarawak, then administered by the Rajah’s nephew, unfortunately sided with Matusin, and interfered with arms in her hands within the Sultan’s territory. Before, however, these latter acts occurred, the Rajah had been to Brunei to try and induce the Sultan to let him settle matters in the Sago Rivers,[10] and although no formal documents were executed he was requested to see that right was done, but the Sultan would have nothing to do with that man of violence, Matusin. The Rajah went to Muka, and a period of calm followed this visit, but nothing was settled on a permanent basis.