I Knew This, But I Had In Mind The Case Of The Doriri Tribe, Who Lived In The Interior A Little To The South Of Us.

These Doriri (who had had the kindly forethought to send us word that they were coming down to pay

Us a visit to eat us, for the Papuan, though a savage, is often most suave and courteous and by no means lacking in humour), were reported to us as having many tails, but needless to say when we made some prisoners, we were scarcely disappointed to find that the said tails protruded from the back of the head (in much the same fashion as the Chinaman's pigtail); in this case each man had many tails, which were fashioned by rolling layers of bark from a certain tree - closely allied, I believe to the "paper tree" of Australia - round long strands of hair.

We three white men had many a long talk as to whether these swamp-dwellers were worth going in search of, but I soon came round to Monckton's way of thinking. Acland, alone, however, maintained to the last that the whole thing was a myth, and jokingly said to Monckton: "When you find these duck-footed people, you had better see that Walker does not take them for birds, and shoot and skin a couple of specimens of each sex and add them to his collection." (For my chief hobby in this and many other countries all over the world consisted in adding to my fine collections of birds and butterflies in the old country.)

As we three, with our twenty-five native police and four servant boys, rowed up the Barigi River in our large government whaleboat, on our way to search for these "duck-footed" people, I could not help being struck with the very great beauty of the scene. Giant trees laden with their burden of orchids, parasites and dangling lianas, surrounded us on both sides, their wide-spreading branches forming a leafy arcade far over our heads, while palms in infinite variety, intermixed with all sorts of tropical forms of vegetation, and rare ferns, grew thickly on the banks.

Some distance behind us came our large fleet of canoes, bearing our bags of rice and over one hundred carriers, and as they paddled down the dark green oily waters of this natural arcade, with much shouting and the splashing of many paddles, it made a scene which is with me yet and is never to be forgotten. As we proceeded, the river got more narrow, and fallen trees from time to time obstructed our way. We at length landed at a spot where we were met by a large number of the Baruga tribe, who brought us several live pigs tied to poles, and great quantities of sago, plantains and yams. They had expected us, as we had camped in their country the previous night. They had been "licked" into friendliness by Monckton, who less than a year ago (as elsewhere mentioned) had sunk their canoes, and together with the aid of the crocodiles, which swarm in this river, had annihilated a large force of them.

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