46 Naturalist at Large 



Wallace said, as he drew near, "I looked with intense in- 

 terest on those rugged mountains, retreating ridge behind 

 ridge into the interior, where the foot of civilized man had 

 never trod. There was the country of the cassowary and 

 the tree kangaroo, and those dark forests produce the most 

 extraordinary and the most beautiful of the feathered in- 

 habitants of the earth — the varied species of the bird of 

 paradise." Wallace was not given to hyperbolic expres- 

 sion, for he had been collecting commercially in the Indies 

 for years before he approached Papua, and had had his 

 senses somewhat benumbed by a long stay in Amazonia 

 before that. 



Think, then, what were the feelings of a youngster just 

 of age, whose previous tropical experience had been a single 

 voyage to the Bahamas and something of India and Burma 

 on the way east. As we moved slowly through the strait, 

 with the billowing mountains of green near at hand, the 

 little villages of thatched huts borne on high stilts by the 

 Waterside, catamarans and sailing prows constantly moving 

 along the shore, I was completely overcome. I am ridicu- 

 lously emotional by nature, and when the first mate, who 

 stood beside me in the bow, pointed ahead and said, "That 

 is Papoea," as the Dutch call New Guinea, a lump which 

 I could hardly swallow came in my throat. 



Then followed unforgettable days indeed. Sorong pro- 

 duced a spiny anteater which we kept alive and were able 

 to observe. A dish of ground coconut soon accumulated 

 enough ants, which we thought would keep it happy. They 

 didn't, and I am quite sure now its principal food is earth- 

 worms and not insects. The great, bird-winged butterflies 

 of the genus Ornithoptera were abundant. They flew so 



