25 



rises green against the ever-changing lights of its 



From a scenic point of view, Embi Lake is a most and nipa swamp lands. Here and there a higher bank 

 beautiful sheet of water. The island sel in its middle is met with, but for the most pail there is nothing but 



mangrove mud. In this the native of the delta lives, 

 waters, while the wooded mountains roll down to its and apparently prospers. A description of the man- 

 grove formation will be found on pages 47 and 48. 



Going up any of these waterways to a point where fresh 

 water is met with, one comes to rain forest. The first 

 river investigated was the Baroi, from which good com- 



margm, 



their peaks, 6,000 feet above, mirrored at 



one's feet. 



Forests Between the Wire Rope Bridge and the mun i ca tion is possible through the Wami to Romilly 



Sound, where, as I have shown on page 177, large ships 



Main Range. 



I took the track that leads from Buna to Kokoda, ca » e ^r. As will be seen from the map, the Baroi 



twists and turns m a remarkable manner, bometimes 



the two sides of a hair-pin bend are less than 10 chains 

 across. This is a characteristic of all the rivers passing 

 through low-lying country. The Baroi, right up to the 

 . trifurcation of the Purari into its main delta 

 waterways, is very little above tidal waters, and at the 



and so on to Port ^Moresby, crossing the main range 



at about 9,000 feet, at a point called The Gap. Between 



the wire rope bridge over the Kumusi and Kokoda the 

 country alters a great deal. One has left the plain 

 country, and the rise per mile, though still very gentle, 

 is more noticeable. The foothills of the mam range 



w 



Mambare. The going is again flat, but the forests, 

 hich are of the rain forest type, are not of good 

 quality. The trees are curiously small, and this seems 

 more marked as regards diameter than height. At first 



crowd down on all sides, and the whole view is one of same time it is subject to violent rises and falls, due 

 very hilly country. One crosses the Oivi, and here a to big floods in the main river. Such conditions make 

 very sharp, short rise occurs, and climbing out of the for instability of a watercourse, and the Baroi has 

 basin of the Kumusi one enters that of the Yodda, doubtless made and unmade countless channels since it 

 which flows north to north-west till it empties into the first started depositing silt. It do not know if its ever 



clear, but all the time I was on the river it was yellow, 

 and water stood for 24 hours in a bucket would pre- 

 cipitate nearly a quarter of an inch of silt. That the 

 course is permanent at all in any part of its length is 

 they seem to be young trees, and the question presents very doubtful, and such permanence as it banks possess 

 itself, " Has the valley of the Yodda at one time carried must be due to the timber. From 

 a heavy population?" At present it is little peopled, delta to the Wami it is a fine deep waterway, flowing 



about l\ miles an hour, but, though quite fresh, it is 

 affected by the flood tides which dam back its waters. 

 The timber is found growing on all those portions of 

 the banks which are high enough to be more or less 

 well drained. These generally occur on the convex sides 

 of the numerous turns. Thus, opposite every piece of 

 timber trees in rain forest formation. If it is a young high forest is a stretch of low land fringed with rushes, 

 forest, it may or may not have passed through the sue- behind which may be a stand of young ilimo in pure 



head of the 



and the explanation generally advanced is that the war- 

 like tribes on all sides made it a no-man's land. The 

 soil has every appearance of being rich ; it is alluvium, 



on which natives would establish splendid taro and 

 potato patches, and on which one would expect to find, 

 in the absence of population, a dense stand of tall 



cessive stages of weed regrowth to high forest. 



J n formation; or without any such tree-growth, the sago 



composition it resembles the mixed forests of the plains p a l m swamp begins. Even on the convex side the forest 



I have already described. Geologically, the country is extends only a little way back from the river, and from 



of recent format ion, but recent only as geological epochs 5 to j chains brings one to swamp land. These sago 



go ; and what is the life of a tree to such a period of formations are the characteristic vegetation of this low 



time as that covered by the deposit of alluvium in the land re(T i on> all( j the ram forests are little islands 



Yodda Valley? Close investigation is necessary before i m i gll ifi can t dote in a sea of swampy country. This is 



this and several other apparently young forests can be a r £ h food country> an( j the native of the delta has no 



explained. The Government station of Kokoda (1,200 difficult in getting supplies of sago, not only to satisfy 



feet) stands on the point of a peniplam, overlooking himgelf but "to export to other communities to the east, 



e Yodda Valley. The forest at the back of the ' ^ dlfficuh to ob(ailK Thus the lakatoi, 



th 



station is of the rain forest type, and better in quality 



than that growing along the Yodda. I did not, how- 



leave Hanuabada, the Port 



laden with cooking pots, 



Moresby villages, and sail to the delta to buy sago 



ever, make a survey of it, as it was necessary to reach ^ J^ rf ^ ^ ^ ^^ ^ {j ^ for 



Port Moresby as soon as possible. A description of the 

 mountainous country which was passed through, be- 

 tween Kokoda and Kagi— 4,800 feet, on the western 

 side of the main range, and the country between 4,800 



feet and sea level will be found in a separate 

 section. 



the delta native also makes gardens to grow bananas, 

 and for this purpose cuts down small patches of forest 

 along the banks of the rivers above the tidal waters. 

 So, travelling up the Baroi, one passes numerous garden 

 houses, planted in small clearings of the rain forest. 



will now pass on to the western ena ot f r* » 



\wn iiwir f»» . ^^ Here the boys camp, too, when they come to get logs 



Parma and describe the ram forest regions that occur w»« * j • r »• > j © 



rapua, ana acscrioe me id g fc canoes; they do not build the canoes, however, 



behind the great network of tidal waterways that ioim > J . ... . 



the delta of the Purari River and the mouths of the 



ether rivers lying between that river and the Kikori. 



Rain Forests of the Delta Division. 



Some idea of the enormous extent of this tidal swamp 

 country may be gathered from the fact that I entered 

 there island waterways at Alele Mouth in a launch 

 drawing 3 ft. 4 in./ and made my way to Kikori— 

 about 85 miles in a straight line— without going out 

 to sea. All those tidal waterways are, as might be 

 expected, split up with innumerable areas of mangrove river 



for there are tradesmen in the villages who are skilled 

 in cut ting out the canoes, just as there are artists who 

 alone can decorate them with traditional and very 

 attractive designs. As I shall show later, these appar- 

 ently very primitive natives are really better organized 

 than most tribes in Papua. 



Taking the whole length of the fresh water portion 

 of the Baroi, 25 miles, I estimated the area of forest 

 to be equal to one-half the length multiplied by an 



average width of five chains — this works out at 1,000 

 acres. Altogether five camps were made along this 



and thus a good proportion of 



the standin 



