They Also Brought A Curious Fighting Ornament Worn On The Head, Made Of Upper Bills Of The Hornbill.

We continued our march through some thick forest, and at length came to the banks of a river, where we suddenly crouched down.

An armed man was crawling along the river bed, peering in all directions, and shouting out to his friends on the opposite bank. We were anxious to make a capture. Monckton suddenly gave the word, and up jumped a dozen police in front of me and plunged into the river and gave chase. I followed hard, but the police in front were gradually leaving me far behind. Till then I always fancied I could run a bit, but I knew better now. Seeing the man's shield, which he had thrown away in his flight, I at once collared it as a trophy of the chase. Then looking around, I found that I was quite alone, and the thick jungle all around me resounded with the loud angry shouts and cries of the enemy. I found out afterwards that my friends and the rest had no intention of giving chase, but had been highly amused in watching my poor effort to keep up with the nimble barefooted police. I shall never forget those uncomfortable few minutes as I rushed down the track in the direction the police had taken. Visions arose before me of the part I should play in a cannibal feast, and I expected every minute to feel the sharp point of a spear entering the small of my back, just as I had been seeing our people drive their spears clean through some running pigs.

To my dismay I found the track divided, and it was impossible to tell which way the police had gone. To turn back was out of the question. I had come a good way, and I had no idea where the rest were, and from the uproar at the back I imagined the Doboduras were coming down the track after me. I hastily decided to go by the old saying, "If you go to the right you are right," and it was well for me that I did so, as I found out later from the police that if I had gone to the left - well, there would have been nothing left of me, especially after one Dobodura meal, as the enemy were there in full force. As it was, I soon afterward came up with the police, feeling rather shaky and white.

The police had captured a middle-aged woman, whose face and part of her body were thickly plastered with clay. This was a sign of mourning. We learnt that she was a Notu woman, who had been captured some time previously by the Doboduras. She was much alarmed, and whined and beat her breasts, and caressed some of the police. We made her come on with us, and the rest of the party soon joining us, we came to another village, which we "rushed," but it, too, was deserted. There was more killing of fowls and pigs, and a scene of great confusion as our people speared and clubbed them and ran about in all directions, looting the houses, picking coconuts, and cutting down betel-nut palms, many of them decorating themselves with the beautifully variegated leaves of crotons and DRACAENAS, some of which were of species entirely new to me. It seemed a bit curious that these wild cannibals should exhibit such a taste for these gay and brilliantly coloured leaves and flowers, which they had evidently transplanted from forest and jungle to their own village.

We continued our way through bush and open country, our police having slight skirmishes with small bands of natives. One big Dobodura rushed at Sergeant Kimi with uplifted club, but Kimi coolly knelt down and shot him in the stomach when he was only a few yards off. The round, sharp stone on the club being an extra fine one, I soon exchanged it with Kimi for two sticks of tobacco (the chief article of trade in New Guinea, and worth about three half-pence a stick).

Toku, Monckton's boy, and a brother of my boy, Arigita, who carried his master's small pea-rifle, shot a man in the back with it as the man fled, and thereafter was a hero among the boys. Arigita wished to emulate his brother, and begged hard to do some shooting on his own account with my twelve-bore shot gun, which he carried, and he seemed very much hurt because I would not allow it.

We passed through many more villages, embowered in palm groves, and in each village we saw plenty of human skulls and long sticks with human jawbones hanging upon them. On one I counted twenty-five; there were also long rows of the jawbones of pigs, and a few crocodiles' heads. These villages were all deserted, the natives having fled. At length we came to what appeared, from its great size, to be the chief village, which we later learnt was named Dobodura. It extended some distance, and stood amid thousands of coconut palms. Here we determined to camp, but we found that most of the police had rushed on ahead after the Doboduras, much to Monckton's annoyance, for it was risky, to say the least, as the enemy might easily have attacked each party separately. But the police and carriers, now that they had "tasted blood," seemed to get quite out of hand, and their savagery coming to the surface, they rushed about as if demented. However, they soon returned with more captured weapons of warfare, having killed two more men, and they also brought two prisoners, a young man and a young woman. The prisoners looked horribly frightened, having never seen a white man before, and they thought they would be eaten: so Constable Yaidi told me.

The man was a stupid looking oaf, and seemed too dazed to speak.

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