Life in the forests of the Far East (vol. 2 of 2) — A Closer Reading

River Journeys and Their Obstacles

The Limbang River dominates the early chapters. St. John records its winding course, the 'cataract' that must be shot, and the 'ponds' whose origin he investigates through native geographical information. Movement is rarely straightforward: floods force dangerous positions, and the party must wait for the river to rise or fall. The author’s attention to the physical details of travel—the dragging of boats over sand, the sharp-edged rocks that slow ascent—gives the reader a tactile sense of the terrain. These passages are interspersed with local stories, such as the 'enchanted mountain' and the explanation of salt springs, which St. John records without dismissing them.

Encounters with Authority and Architecture

A visit to datu Daniel’s house reveals a compound fortified with a thirty-foot stockade and long eighteen-pounder guns, though only one is mounted. Inside, the bed—thirty feet long and twelve broad—dominates the room, divided by a curtain and surrounded by boxes, jackets, and krises. The description is precise: 'a sort of musty look' pervades the space, despite beautiful mats and ornamented pillows. St. John notes the chain around a man’s neck as he pounds rice, a detail that quietly underscores the coercive labor underpinning the datu’s household. The scene conveys both the material wealth and the discomfort of the chief’s residence.

Political Undercurrents and Historical Memory

St. John’s narrative is alert to the political currents beneath daily life. In Sulu, he records a conversation with Mr. Wyndham, who confesses a preference for Spanish rule while acknowledging an 'unconquerable prejudice' among the Sulus against the Spaniards—a hereditary feeling from three centuries of war. The treaty of 1836 is mentioned, but St. John does not elaborate; he lets the tension stand. Elsewhere, the apathy of the Brunean government, the selling of children, and Kayan barbarity are noted without moralizing. These observations accumulate into a portrait of a region where colonial powers, local rulers, and indigenous groups are in constant, uneasy negotiation.

Natural History Embedded in Travel

St. John’s scientific eye is never idle. He records two new species of Nepenthes and new rhododendrons on Mount Molu, but also notes the behavior of alligators—a man-eater, a challenge accepted, a combat in a cave—and the method of capturing them in Siam. The sago palm receives careful attention: two kinds, their growth, and the method of preparing sago for market. Birds are 'rare, except in certain districts'; monkeys and alligators appear regularly. These observations are woven into the travelogue, not segregated into a separate chapter, so that the natural world remains inseparable from the human journey.

Readers should pay attention to the way St. John moves between scales: from the broad political history of Spanish-Sulu relations to the specific texture of a datu’s bed or the taste of a Malay curry. The volume’s structure mirrors the expeditions themselves—advancing, pausing, diverting—and rewards those who read with patience for its digressions. The index of chapters provides a useful map, but the real interest lies in the incidental details that accumulate into a dense, lived account of mid-nineteenth-century Borneo.

Those river journeys in St. John’s second volume—the slow patience of waiting on tides and local whim—reminded me of a different diary, one where travel felt less like discovery and more like listening. There’s a similar quietude in his Bornean notes and in My American Diary — Text and Context, that sense of days passing without resolution. I found myself comparing how each writer records what they cannot quite understand.