192 



An 



march from Aroisa 



to the 



Yoge River, which 



flood, 



brought us 

 must be trouble- 



hour's .__ _ 



when in 



some, for the banks are 150 yards apart, 

 crossed, the river was confined to a 10-yard stream, 

 knee deep, running in the centre of this stony waste 

 of river bed. 



Wi 



One hour and ten minutes more walking, divisions. 



well. An hour and a half brought us to the Uria River, 

 When I and on the other side a patch of old forest and lots of 



coco-nuts, and beyond, in the grass, the largo village 

 of Koromo. This consists of 42 beehive houses in two 



There is a tree in the middle, and a watch- 



and we reached the Mene River where it flowed into man on it had announced our coming, so that, except 



for a circle of old men sitting under the tree, the place 

 was quite deserted. These proved very timid, but they 



the Ramu. 



We had been following the bank of the 



It is 



is 



big river for an hour with no track to guide us. 

 probable that the river — it is 400 yards wide here 

 used as the road in the dry season. We continued up 

 the bank of the Ramu, now on a bed of gravel, now 

 cutting our way through tall wild sugar until after an 

 hour's rather slow progress we met the Mosea River, 

 which we followed up and saw in the distance, rising 

 from a clump of trees in the plain, the smoke of a 



This was Am age — our destination — and 



village. 



guides, having shown it to us, put down their loads and 

 bolted, all except a rather old man, whom I persuaded 



were induced to take in the Amage boys' loads, and we 

 went on through a banana garden and across more 

 Savannah and a little river called Tunierumo to the 

 large river Mimea. This was 300 yards wide from bank 

 to bank, and was running in full flood; all attempts 

 to ford it failed and so we had lunch by the bank, and 

 later decided to camp there as we must wait for the 

 our river to go down or find a crossing above. With two 



Koromo boys as guides and Jack, I went up to the 

 Mimea and found a bad crossing 1 near where 



to come on by offering him a tomahawk, 

 a well-beaten pad leading from a yam garden to the 



and following this through the crop, reached 



We soon met bouches from the hills. 



to 



water, and following this through the crop 

 Amage in one and a quarter hours. 



We had learnt to approach strange 

 quietly, so as to surprise the inhabitants 



villages 



very 

 and make 



surprise 

 friends with them before they had time to think about 

 running away. A country which has boon subjected to 

 all the horrors of unregulated " recruiting," naturally o-rass 



crossing near wnere it de- 

 One Koromo boy got over but 



only by the skin of his teeth, so w£ continued up our 

 side while the other boy went off to a village called 

 Sawasa, which was now clearly visible a little further 

 up on the other side. What was equally clear was the 

 stampede of the inhabitants, who could be seen running 

 up the foothills, which had been recently burnt and 

 were covered with 



short, young, wonderfully green 

 My ambassador managed to restore some con- 

 fidence, and by the time I was opposite the village some 

 ten or twelve boys had come down to the cliff — the river 

 is here torrential, and shut in between steep walls 

 and were gesticulating. Owing to the loss of my first 

 guides, I have had no interpreter for a day, and I had 

 to make my needs known by signs. This was not diffi- 

 cult, and soon some of the boys were off to get food for 

 us. Others made it quite clear that to attempt to cross 

 there was madness, and that the crossing by my camp 

 In the end, the oldest of the inhabitants sold us a was the only possible one. There is no doubt that I 



does not welcome strange people. We surprised eight 

 old people in the village and the men ran for their 

 bows and arrows, which were leaning against the doors 

 of their huts ; but when they saw I had no arms — my 

 three police boys were well in the background and my 

 carriers were without bows and arrows, and one of 

 them talked their language, they were less afraid, and 

 by the time my tent was up and the cooking started, 

 bananas and taro were being brought to us. 



pig, and while the young people of the village did not 

 show up, the elderly people, including three women, 

 stuck to the place all night. 



There is» a patch of forest all round Amage, and it 

 boasts also- a fine chimp of coco-nuts, which have been 

 planted in the opening just round the houses. The 

 bush is typical rain forest ,and is a remnant of the 

 forest that must have once stretched from the foothills 

 right across the Ramu valley. This little clump is 

 probably preserved as protection for the village and a 

 sanitary depot. The rest of the country is Savannah, 



the only trees scattered through it are S&rcocephalus, 

 Clerodendron, and Albizzia proccra. There are two 



I noticed, however, that the 



grasses, 



one is Kunai or Kurakur 



the Lalang of the 



east and Imperoht of botanists — and this confined ti 



the 



deep alluvial soils : the other 

 which tak 



a 



kangaroo 



grass, 

 the place of the first as soon as there is a 

 heavy mixture of gravel in the alluvium. The valley 

 is widening rapidly, and the distance from foothills to 



can fight my way up the foothills and cross higher up 

 still, but it is doubtful if it will not take longer than 

 waiting for the river to go down. I returned to camp 

 while boys bearing food came down the other bank and 

 managed in the manner already described on the Ramu 

 to dance their way over, 

 maximum load they would take was two bunches of 

 taro, and then one boy was washed down and lost his 

 bundle. They did not go back, but camped with us for 



the night, and were most interested in the whole camp, 

 particularly in the pots and the food cooked. There 

 was not enough taro to go round, and I supplemented 

 it with rice, which they, of course had never seen, and 

 they watched my boys eating it by the handful out of 

 the kerosene tin I used as a saucepan, and after a little 

 while were induced to try some, only to make sour 

 faces and spit it out. They seem to* me more the 



Papuan type, while the Koromo men and those from 

 Abage were obviously of a more Melanesian breed. I 



river is quite 7 miles now. ^ Above, on the hills, .stand was suprprised at the depth of soil that is shown m 

 out fine ridges of hoop pine and Araucaria Klinkii. every deeo cut the Mimea has made. In one bank — 48 



In one bank — 48 

 I judged these groves to be 1,500 feet higher than the feet "high— I took a note of the strata exposed, which 

 plain, which is 1,100 feet at Amage. The people here were as follows:— 1 foot of dark brown, almost black, 

 are of a different type; their houses are better, and loam; then 5 feet of red loam and gravel, then 15 feet 

 they only carry bows and arrows, no spears. The 

 women wear grass skirts, hung lower than I have ever 

 seen them, reminding one of the tapi cloth worn by 



de maiden. I am now opposite " Twin 



the Hinendel 



of an agglomerate — the river is full of boulders of this 

 — below 15 feet of gravel, and between these twoi a 



seepage of discoloured water occurs; then comes 7 feet 



of sand and gravel, and finally at base and down to the 

 water, which was rapidly eating into and undermining 

 the cliff, was 6 feet of the same dark red loam as was 

 found in the second stratum. 



I noticed villages up on the hills, and got the names 

 of five of them. I was also pointed out the general 

 direction of the native Mission Station, which lies on 

 Amage to come along, and so we set off, and crossing the bank of the Ramu on my side and under a biggish 

 (he Faria River we pursued our journey across a vast hill T have been taking bearings to. To go there I have 



plain, dotted with Albizzia and Sarcocephalus. to go out of my way to Sawasa and then back, why, I 

 A good view was obtained of the country to the south- cannot say, though the natives have made this quite. 



Mountain/ 1 and so only one peak is visible; observa- 

 tion of four stars put Amage 5 deg. 53 min. 52 sec. 

 south. What a nuisance having no wireless. 



24th March. — Our only local carrier bolted during 

 the night, leaving the tomahawk at my tent flap, IIow- 



I had no trouble in getting four men from 



ever 



grass 



