In November, 1860, the Rajah left England, and with him went the Consul-General, Mr. S. St. John, and Mr. Henry Stuart Johnson[264] to join his uncle's service. After a short detention in Singapore waiting for the _Rainbow_, he arrived at Kuching on February 12, 1861.
The Consul-General now officially informed the Council of Sarawak that the British Government disavowed and totally disapproved of Governor Edwardes' proceedings. But though they reprimanded him, they supported him in office. His term as Governor was, however, very shortly to expire, but not till he had seen, what must have been gall and bitterness to his soul, as it certainly was to his backers in England, the cession by the Sultan to Sarawak of Muka and all the region of the sago plantations, the produce of which he had hoped to secure for Labuan, and the banishment of Sherip Masahor from Borneo.
Mr. St. John went on to Bruni and relieved Mr. Edwardes of his position as Consul-General, and was the tactful and just medium for arranging the difficulties produced by the conduct of the latter. He says:
I established myself in the capital, to find the Sultan sulky at the failure of Mr. Edwardes' promises. I remained quiet for a few weeks, when I found his Highness gradually coming round, but it was long ere I was again established first adviser to the Crown, for Mr. Edwardes' promises had either been great, or had been misunderstood, and they thought that the British Government was about to remove the English from Sarawak, and return the country to them.[265]
In April the Rajah went to Bruni. The Sultan and the wazirs received him warmly, and the good understanding between the two countries was established anew. The Sultan was now anxious to place Muka and the intermediate places under the Rajah's rule, but the latter waived this consideration until hostilities were over. The Rajah then went to Oya, Mr. St. John accompanying him, also the Sultan's envoy, Haji Abdul Rahman, bearing private letters and messages from the Sultan pressing Pangiran Nipa not to fight. Here the principal chiefs were seen, and the Sultan's commands that hostilities should cease and that Sherip Masahor was to be banished were read to them.[266]