178 



the soppy forest. The forest passed through to-day- 

 was, at first of mossy character, but the absence 

 of pronounced aerial roots and spring-mattress effect 

 under foot, showed that we were still at the lower 

 limits of the mossy forest; by 11 o'clock, however, 



the conditions became more mossy, and conifers, Eug- 

 enia and Colophyllum became plentiful, taking the 

 place of a curious pole wood we had passed through 

 till now. All the trees were now enveloped in thick 

 moss and made to look twice their diameter. Aerial 



roots wore common and some Dacrydium stood up on 

 these, like mangroves. The springiness of the filmy 



fern-covered forest floor increased; here and there areas 



of it were covered with a dense carpet of dawsonia 

 moss standing like seedling pines. The boys showed 

 me a trick with the aerial rooted trees. By filling «up 

 the spaces between the prop roots and making a rough 

 mountain bamboo or twig door to shut one opening, 

 they soon had a good shelter for half a dozen boys. 

 Dryish wood could also be found under these propped 

 boles and soon fires were going. At night these red 

 glows, issuing from the roots of grotesque gnarled trees, 

 gave a weird look to the camp. The best camp tree 

 was the celery top {Phyllocl adits) ; this, even in the 



mossy forest, makes a bole of 2 feet in diameter, and 



is perched on such a network of aerial roots that quite Busu - The g uide calls this Mbngibus, which may be 



a corruption of Mongi bush. We are a few hundred 



feet (8,550 feet) lower than last night's camp, and 



being open country it is warmer than in the dripping 



moss forest. Still, the weather is disagreeable, and 



out from mossy forest to a long grassed valley, with 

 the river flowing rapidly down the middle of it. The 

 bush came down on each side to a fringe of dead burnt 

 trees and tall tree ferns with scorched tops. The fires 

 here can only have been a month old, for the young 

 grass on its blackened raised rhizomes is only a few 

 inches high and of a vivid green colour. There is no 

 doubt that periods of intense drought occur at this 

 altitude. Yet to-day it started raining at 10 a.m., 

 and only ceased at 6.30 p.m.; the forest was so wet as 

 to be for the most part marshy. The last part of the 

 journey was through forest which was not quite mossy 

 in character, or perhaps I should say, was not the 

 mossy type of Mount Obree, in Papua. The trees are 

 larger — 50 feet high, and up to 2 feet in girth. There 

 are aerial roots, but not to the degree that one walks 



The whole is thickly 



of the smoother 



on an elevated mass of roois 



clothed in moss except for some 



stemmed conifers. 



liig 



Podocarpvs were 



rare; 



two 



Dacrydium and Phyllocladus and Libocedrus taking 



their place. I was surprised at the number of medium 

 sized lianas that hang about the crowns; also- at the en- 

 tire absence of mountain palms, rattans, bamboos and 

 pandanu9. We followed up the pretty grass valley and 

 pitched camp close to the junction of the Mongi and 



a number of natives can camp under one of them. 



17th November. — The morning broke cloudy, and we 

 struck camp in a white clinging mist at 6 o'clock. I 

 pushed the carriers on, and remained behind to bake 

 bread. By 7 a.m., the sun pierced the clouds, and the 



temperature rose to 55 degrees Fahr., and the piccinin 

 kept to help me, and I felt less depressed. By 8.20 

 we were off with a somewhat depressed loaf to catch 

 up the loads. The boiling point height of last night's 

 camp was 8,727 feet. First we climbed some 1,500 feet, 

 rising and falling, and meeting no change in the charac- 

 ter of the forest. It was all decidedly mossy. Then we 

 reached the first patch of grass, a little hole in the 

 mossy forest, obviously the result of fire. Here a 



number of Libocedrus and Dacrydium were trying to 

 restore forest conditions. They were some 40 feet high, 

 and looked most ornamental in their grass setting, the 

 picture being rendered quite park-like by a large bush 

 of port-wine flowered Rhododendron in front of them. 



Two sclerophvllus shrubs, one of the Rhododendron 



my view is bounded by the mist-hung forest skirting 

 the grassed area and every now and then the valley 

 itself is blotted out by a bank of mist rolling down 

 over everything. This is a settled native camping 

 ground, and here the people from Ogeramnang meet the 

 people of Kombo- when they go hunting; all beyond to 

 the west and south-west is the Kombo people's hunting 

 country, and in old days trespass by Ogeramnang folk 

 would have meant death. Mission influence has brought 

 these two warring tribes into friendly relations, and so 

 the Kombo men and women we found in a camp on the 

 Busu did not run away when our large party arrived, 

 but came out to welcome us. Late this afternoon I 

 noticed our neighbours making off, and I asked the 

 guide what was the matter and why these people were 

 going, and it turned out that they were all going to 

 Kombo to get food for me and my carriers, so that when 



family, and the other an Epacridaceae, also another we returned from Sarawaket we should find a plentiful 





hard-leafed shrub," 20 feet high, a large vernonia, 25 

 feet high, completed the woody growth on this grass 



island. A few tree ferns that had escaped the fire stood 



30 feet high, and gave llie formation a permanent a,)- an d"a whke'tuftTo their^tails. 



upply. The hunting had not been very successful, for 

 my boys only managed to bring in two opossum-like 

 animals — grey-blue fur above and white underneath, 



I find I have a grow- 

 ing army of camp followers, who, armed with bows and 

 arrows, are taking the opportunity afforded by my visit- 

 ing these heights to combine hunting with the pleasure 

 of seeing what the white man is doing. Thev are 



pearance. This grass patch will grow, and every fire will 

 eat into the surrounding forest, where the dead trees 

 and undergrowth of sclerophyllous shrubs mark the 



limit of the last conflagration. Crossing a brook, one 

 of the heads of the Bulling, we came to a succession of 

 grass islands, separated by moss forest, and one grass 

 patch was a largish valley, and the last fire was not 

 more than a year old. The encircling skeleton 

 Dacrydium ) Pod&c&rpus, Libocedrus^ and Phyllocladns 



were still blackened, and here and there stood little 



patches of burnt sapling conifers. The forest had tried 18th November. — A glorious day of cloud-flecked 



to re-establish itself, but had been beaten by the blue sky. It rained hard all night, not a light mist, 



hunters' fire. All over the open land were bushes of but a solid thunder rain. So bright a day was a great 



red rhododendron in full flower. The valley proved surprise. The boys had got very cold in the night, and 



to be a succession of deepish holes in the limestone they were hard to start at 6.15 a.m., but we got away 



formation, and some are filled with water, making eventually, I bringing up the rear and shooing back 



miniature lakes, the largest of which the guide called camp followers. Rising from the valley of the Busu we 



Topizan. Tnto these holes would bubble a stream, only crossed a divide. The forest here was of good conifer- 



sponging on the hard working carriers, who cheerfully 

 divide their little ration of rice with the loafers. I ex- 

 plained to> the guide, who is a mission teacher of Oger- 

 amnang, that on present rations I could feed twenty 

 men, and that was all I could take with me. 



to disappear and reappear lower down in another de- 

 pression. Rising slightly, we crossed the divide be- 

 tween the Bulling and the Mongi, and then dropped 

 steeply down to the head of that river. After a 



ous type, the trees had boles of 2ft. 9in. in diameter, 



and a large percentage were Libocedrus. Dacrydium 



came next, but Phyllocladns were scarce. Just on the 

 top was a burnt patch of forest from which I caught 



scramble along a pig track of a path, we suddenly came a glimpse of the summit of Sarawaket, only a few miles 

 — — ~~ ~ " to the west. This burnt patch is an excellent example 



* SuMeqiifMitlv identified by Mr. C. T. White as Rh nlximdron communis n -. .-. , .. , x . m-i ; . _ i i n i, 



lHpi»6ortaip.,styphdiaap.,9adEuryaBv.nov. of how the destruction starts, lne trees had all been 



