...
The Malay Archipelago, in the unregenerated days when Wallace
roamed the forests, and sailed the Straits in native boats and
canoes, was full of danger to wanderers of the white race. Anarchy
prevailed in many parts; usurping nobles enslaved the people in
their houses; and piratical fleets scoured the sea, capturing and
enslaving yearly thousands of peaceful traders, women and
children. The writer was himself in 1862 besieged in a Bornean
river by a pirate fleet, which was eventually destroyed by a
Sarawak Government steamer with the following result of the fight:
190 pirates and 140 captives were killed or drowned, and 250 of
the latter were liberated and sent to their homes; showing how
formidable these pirates were. But Wallace, absorbed in his
scientific pursuits, minded not these dangers, nor the hardships
of any kind which a roving life in untrodden jungles and feverish
swamps brings.
When Wallace left Sarawak after his fifteen months' residence in
the country, he left his young assistant, Charles Allen, there.
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