It should be added that these Ibans frankly acknowledged that the
Resident had been too clever for them, and that they bore him no
ill-will; and that some of them, accompanying him on later excursions,
proved themselves willing helpers and agreeable companions.
Other and larger expeditions of armed forces have in the past been
led against tribes or villages, generally on account of their having
refused to surrender to the government members guilty of taking heads
or of attacking other villages wantonly and without permission. In
all cases the government officers have relied almost exclusively
upon the services of bodies of natives under the immediate charge of
their own chiefs and armed only with their native weapons. In some
cases the offending parties have fled from their villages without
offering active resistance; and in these cases the government force
has usually been content to inflict punishment by burning down their
houses and taking what property was left in them.
It is perhaps too much to hope that no cases of taking heads or of
wanton attack on jungle parties or on weak villages will ever again
occur. But such incidents have become very infrequent and the offenders
have seldom escaped punishment; for, unlike our own population, many
thousands of whom live detached from all local bonds as isolated
floating units unknown to the government and to those among whom
they dwell, every man in Sarawak, with the partial exception of the
nomad jungle-dwellers, is a member of some local group which is held
responsible by the government for his good behaviour; thus in every
district every man is known, if not as an individual, at least as a
member of some community; and every stranger (or party of strangers)
is expected to be able to give a satisfying account of himself; and
any who wish to work in the jungle of any district other than their
own are required to have government permission.
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