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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



are found, while from Redscar Bay eastward a light-brown race in- 

 habits the coast. On the mountains, in the interior, are people inter- 

 mediate between these two in color, and essentially different in all 

 their habits. I should say these are the true aborigines of this part 

 of New Guinea, while the coast tribes, black and brown, are probably 

 settlers. The light-haired natives belong undoubtedly to the same 



Fia. 1. Dueabi, a Native of Kiwai Island, at the Mouth op the Fly Rivek. (Frcm "New 

 Guinea, what I Did and what I Saw." By L. M. D'Albertis.) 



race as the New-Zealanders, Tahitians, Samoans, etc., but are so split 

 up and divided that every few miles of coast brings you to a people 

 speaking a different language from those you have just left. These 

 are often dialects, but are quite as dissimilar as those spoken in the 

 various islands of Eastern Polynesia. Altogether, I know of twenty- 

 five different languages spoken in the three hundred miles of coast I 

 am personally acquainted with. My previous acquaintance with sev- 

 eral languages of Eastern Polynesia was a great help in acquiring that 

 of the people among whom I was living in New Guinea. I had the 

 pleasure of reducing two of these to a written form, and getting books 

 printed in them, and before I left New Guinea I had the greater pleas- 

 ure of hearing some of the native children read fluently in their own 

 language. 



The men are of a warm brown color, muscular and well developed, 

 straight and agile, with fairly well-formed noses, and lips neither pro- 

 truding nor thick. Many have intelligent faces, and all glory in their 

 huge mop of hair. They carefully pull out every hair from their 



