The White Rajahs of Sarawak

Robert hale, London, 1960. First edition. A very ex-library copy of this scarce title. End papers have been replaced and binding is tight. Usual library markings throughout. Age discolouration and some foxing to contents. All illustrations and pages present. A very readable copy. Dust jacket has tape staining but is complete and has been covered.

Forty years have passed since Sir Vyner Brooke, the last of the white rajahs, left Sarawak for good, bringing to an end a story as romantic as any in the history of the East. For over a century the state of Sarawak in the island of Borneo, the home of the famous head-hunting Dyaks, had been ruled with benevolent despotism by a family of Englishmen. This book is their story. It concerns three men. Of the first, James Brooke, Robert Payne says he was the only man who `succeeded in coming from the West and making himself king over an Eastern race and founding a dynasty which lasted for a hundred years,; The second was Charles Brooke, James's nephew, who was rajah for nearly fifty years - a character almost out of the Middle Ages; and the third, Vyner Brooke, son of Charles, to whom fell the task of leading Sarawak, still a mystery land in his father's day, into the 20th century. James, who looked and behaved like a romantic hero, became a legend in his own lifetime. Cast in the mould of the Elizabethen adventurer, he faced piracy and rebellion in Sarawak, misunderstanding and opposition at home. Though life was calmer for his successors, they all showed one thing in common, a love for Sarawak and an understanding of its people...