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Company; was born on the 29th April, 1803; went out to India as
a cadet, where he held advantageous situations, and distinguished
himself by his gallantry in the Burmese war. He was shot through
the body in an action with the Burmese, received the thanks of the
government, and returned to England for the recovery of his prostrated
strength. He resumed his station, but shortly afterward relinquished
the service, and in search of health and amusement left Calcutta for
China in 1830. In this voyage, while going up the China seas, he saw
for the first time the islands of the Asiatic Archipelago--islands
of vast importance and unparalleled beauty--lying neglected, and
almost unknown. He inquired and read, and became convinced that
Borneo and the Eastern Isles afforded an open field for enterprise
and research. To carry to the Malay races, so long the terror of the
European merchant-vessels, the blessings of civilization, to suppress
piracy, and extirpate the slave-trade, became his humane and generous
objects; and from that hour the energies of his powerful mind were
devoted to this one pursuit. Often foiled, often disappointed, but
animated with a perseverance and enthusiasm which defied all obstacle,
he was not until 1838 enabled to set sail from England on his darling
project. The intervening years had been devoted to preparation and
inquiry; a year spent in the Mediterranean had tested his vessel, the
Royalist, and his crew; and so completely had he studied his subject
and calculated on contingencies, that the least sanguine of his friends
felt as he left the shore, hazardous and unusual as the enterprise
appeared to be, that he had omitted nothing to insure a successful
issue. 'I go,' said he, 'to awake the spirit of slumbering philanthropy
with regard to these islands; to carry Sir Stamford Raffles' views
in Java over the whole archipelago. Fortune and life I give freely;
and if I fail in the attempt, I shall not have lived wholly in vain.'

"In the admiration I feel for him, I may farther be permitted to
add, that if any man ever possessed in himself the resources and
means by which such noble designs were to be achieved, that man was
James Brooke! Of the most enlarged views; truthful and generous;
quick to acquire and appreciate; excelling in every manly sport and
exercise; elegant and accomplished; ever accessible; and above all,
prompt and determined to redress injury and relieve misfortune, he
was of all othe