Report from Lundu, October, 1906

The Hon'ble the Resident of the First Division, accompanied by Dr. White-Hopkins and Mr. Stuart Cunynghame, arrived here at 1:30 p.m. on the 1st instant per p.s. Adeh, and returned again at daylight on the 3rd instant.

On the 2nd the Hon'ble Resident attended Court, when several matters of importance were brought before him.

I visitede Simataan from the 20th to 23rd. I was obliged to return sooner than I had intended owing to the unsettled state of the weather. The neaptimes coming on the approaches to the rivers were each day becoming more dangerous.

Nearly all the nacodahs of the bandongs here have been fined for breach of Port Regulations. The falling off in the trade returns caused me to make very minute enquiries as to the reason of this.

I found that to some extend the decrease was due to nacodahs omitting to declare goods which they received after having taken out a "Port Clearance." The importation of tobacco showed a very marked deficit as compared with what it was several years back. This lead me to suppose that a great deal of smuggling had been going on. After close examination of the books and letters of the traders in this district I find that the import of tobacco has kept well up to the average. The mistake appears to be that the shippers in Kuching are in the habit of declaring tobacco as sundries. Although it is almost impossible to prevent a certain amount of smuggling in a district situated as close as this to Dutch Territory, I am glad to be able to report that the smuggling here is practially nil and only goes on among those villages which are nearly on the border.

Draman's boat, which left for Kuching on the 20th instant, was wrecked off Sampadi mouth. The mail was fortunately saved, and no lives were lost.

The fines this month amounted to $216.64.

Per p.s. Adeh on the 1st instant arrived one pony for this station.

The prisoners have been employed the greater part of the month repairing some of the bridges.

The following are the trade returns for Lundu and Simatan.

                              Exports                Imports
Lundu                   $5,789                  $2,089
Simatan                $22,366                $2,748


F.F. Boult
Assistant Resident