the action of July, 1849; he cavilled at the title by which I hold Sarawak; he has accused me of cold-blooded murders; he has denounced me for neglect of public duty, for abuse of official power; for impeding the progress of commercial enterprise; and for establishing a trading monopoly." This frightful list of offences was privately printed and privately circulated, with letters of approval from Mr. Hume, after the evidence upon which they were founded had been twice weighed by parliament, and twice found insufficient. The piratical character of the Malays of the archipelago had never been disputed; it was regarding the Sarebas and Sakarran dyaks that the question was raised. To disprove the first charge, it was only necessary to show that these tribes were not prosecuting mere intertribal feuds, when they burst upon their peaceable neighbours, burnt their dwellings, stole their goods, and carried "women and children into captivity, with the heads of their decapitated husbands and fathers." Sir James produced a list of twenty-one names, in support of his averment, among which were—Monsieur Cornet de Groot, 1839, secretary-general to the Netherland colonial minister; Captain Keppel, 1843-44; the Rajah Muda Hassim; Mr. Church, resident-councillor of Singapore; Colonel Butterworth, governor of Singapore; Admiral Sir Thomas Cochrane; and lastly, the decision of the court of admiralty in Singapore. As he most justly remarks—"A fact cannot be more than proved;" if this array of evidence is insufficient, further argument were hopeless. On the next charge he says—"If by a merchant be meant a person who buys and sells for his own profit, then I have never been a merchant at all. In the year 1845 I was the unpaid agent of the English government; in 1847 I was appointed commissioner and consul-general; and in 1848 became governor of Labuan." During the first years of his residence at Sarawak, Sir James states that he "was obliged to resort to trade to obtain the means of carrying on government;" but no personal benefit accrued to him, as even "so late as 1851 there was an excess of expenditure over receipts, which I willingly made good from my private fortune." The anxiety occasioned by business was distasteful to Sir James; and anxious to place the revenue on a more permanent basis, he, in 1846, leased the antimony ore and opium farm for five years to the Eastern Archipelago Company. Then began Mr. Wise's endeavours to induce Brooke to enter into speculations which would have made him one of the richest commoners in England. His refusal to "risk the welfare of this people for any motives, whether of cupidity or ambition," seems to have excited a feeling of jealousy on Mr. Wise's part towards the man whose disinterestedness he could not understand, and which a subsequent mistake about some letters only served to increase. But Mr. Wise's transactions have been sufficiently exposed. The dealings of the Eastern Archipelago Company have also been laid bare, and the publication of their forgeries and slanders casts an irredeemable blot on the man, who, with every means of investigation in his power, raised the hue and cry against his great countryman on no surer foundation. We have already given the detail of the events by which Sir James was installed as governor at Sarawak. We do not envy any one who, after reading the correspondence with his mother and Mr. Templar on that subject, could accuse him of mean or unworthy motives. The simplicity and beautiful confidence running through all those "private" letters ought to disarm suspicion. Muda Hassim's concession was afterwards officially confirmed by the sultan. It is unnecessary to enter here into a detailed refutation of the remaining charges; but if we have succeeded in giving any idea of his devoted and philanthropic character, and of the love and veneration in which he was held at Sarawak, the designations of "murderer" and "thief," as applied to him, will not receive an imprimatur from our readers. Yet these charges were repeated year after year, during his absence, and again while in London during 1852, with undiminished acrimony. Even then, however, the "great heart of the world was just;" in April, 1852, a public dinner was given him by a large and influential body of men, who were proud to call Sir James Brooke "countryman." Subsequently the fullest justice was appropriately done him at Manchester, by an assembly of its greatest and most enlightened merchants. When hostilities broke out between Great Britain and China, Sir James was at Sarawak, which first set the example of rising against the English. In the course of the outbreak his house, mines, a valuable library, and other property belonging to him, were seized by the insurgents; and escaping for his life, he came to England in 1858. At a public meeting held in London a large sum of money was subscribed to indemnify him for his loss, and in 1860 he went back to Borneo. Before leaving this country, however, he had an attack of paralysis, which greatly weakened him, and from which he never recovered. Having again returned to England, he died on the 11th of June, 1868. We conclude this notice by an extract from a critic not usually given to over-praise:—"Contemplating and judging the work and the man with entire impartiality—without the slightest bias one way or another in his case—being utter strangers to him and all his connections, his friends and his enemies—being in possession of the entire material for a study of his life and acts—and having really and truly studied both—our final conviction is, that James Brooke is one of nature's princes—a man of genius to begin with, and of that high order of genius which can act in any direction; that he has the devout pertinacity of a Columbus, grounded upon a similar sagacity; the gay magnanimity of a Raleigh; the adventurousness of a Cortez; the administrative ability of a Penn; the joyful devotedness of a Père d'Estévan; the moral courage and good sense of a Wellington; the domestic affections of a Collingwood; the robust purity of a hero whose energies are occupied with adequate aims; and the simplicity which is always supposed, when genius is described."—A. J. N.
BROOKES, Joshua, an English anatomist and physiologist, was born 24th November, 1761. Having received his diploma, he visited Paris, where he practised for some time at the Hôtel Dieu. On his return to London, he began to study anatomy, and to form a museum. He was well known as a dissector, and succeeded in making a preparation for preserving his subjects from decay, the composition of which he communicated to the Royal Society, of which he was elected a fellow. He taught anatomy and physiology during forty years, to more than 5000 pupils in all. He published some small papers on subjects connected with his favourite science, and died in 1833.—J. B.
BROOKES, Richard, an English physician, lived about the middle of the eighteenth century, and published works on chocolate, on the natural history of vegetables, on systems of natural history, also an "Introduction to Physic and Surgery," and a "History of China and Tartary."—J. H. B.
BROOKING, an ingenious but unhappy artist, born about 1720. He had a situation in Deptford dockyard, and, suiting his art to his opportunities, "he rose," Pilkington says, "to an eminence little inferior to Vandervelve or Backhuysen." He lived forgotten, and died unknown in 1759—W. T.
BROOKS, Colonel John, LL.D., a distinguished American officer in the revolutionary army, afterwards governor of Massachussets, was born at Medford, Massachussets, June 6, 1752. He served throughout the war with a high reputation as a brave, discreet, and patriotic officer; and when peace was at hand and disaffection pervaded the army, as manifested in the celebrated Newburgh Letters, he was one of those who most actively seconded the exertions of Washington in preventing the officers and troops from taking the redress of their grievances into their own hands. Then he went back to private life, and resumed the medical profession, for which he had been educated. In 1816, on the withdrawal of Governor Strong, he was chosen governor of Massachussetts, and held that office by successive re-elections for seven years, when his advanced age induced him to refuse any longer service. He died, March 1, 1825, leaving a highly-honoured name, untarnished by a single spot either in his public or private career. He published a few orations and discourses, and one medical tract.
BROOKS, Maria, an American poetess of minor fame, born at Medford, Massachussetts, about 1795; died in Cuba, November 11, 1845. Her maiden name was Gowan or Gowen, her nom de plume "Maria dell' Occidente." She wrote "Judith, Esther, and other poems," 1820; "Zophiel, or the Bride of Seven," a poem of six cantos; and a pure romance, telling the story of her own life, and named "Idomen, or the Vale of Yumuri." In 1830 she accompanied a brother to Paris, and spent the spring of 1831 at Keswick with Southey, who prepared an edition of "Zophiel" for the press. The Doctor pronounced her "the most impassioned and most imaginative of all poetesses;" and Longfellow, in Kavanagh, quotes some "tender, melancholy lines," from her poem on "Marriage."
BROOME, William, born in Cheshire; died at Bath in 1745; the date of his birth is not known; educated on the foundation
