964 VOLCANIC ACTIVITY ON THE ISLANDS NEAR NEW GUINEA, 



direction of some small streams, the old mouths of which had 

 been closed by bars of sand left behind by waves ; a great number 

 of old pathways in the forest, between the villages, which I knew 

 well, having used them daily during 15 months in 1871 and 1872, 

 were impassable on account of many large trees which had come 

 down during the earthquake. 



On the hills, the natives showed me in many places long 

 crevices 1-3 feet wide and 3 or 4 feet deep, as the remaining marks 

 of the " tangrin-boro" (1). The depth of the sea near the coast in 

 some places has been also altered, so that, for instance in Port 

 Constantine the old soundings made by the officers of H.I. R. M.S. 

 " Vitiaz " in Sept. 1871, proved in many details incorrect as 

 well as the outlines of the harbour (Port Constantine'). 



Talking about earthquakes, the natives informed me, that on a 

 former occasion, before my arrival on the coast in 1871, a village 

 named Aralu (situated on the coast between the rivers, Gabeneu and 

 Koli) had been completely swept away by the waves after an earth- 

 quake. All the huts, and the cocoanut trees surrounding them, were 

 broken down and carried away by the tidal waves, and the inhabi- 

 tants, men, women, and children were drowned (it occurred during 

 the night.) A few men belonging to the village and who happened 

 to be away at the time on a visit to some neighbouring village, 

 would not attempt to rebuild their huts on the old place, but went 

 to live at Gumbu, also a coast village but which had escaped 

 destruction being built further inland. The destruction cf Aralu 

 was well remembered by not very old people and it took place I 

 suppose (2) about the year 1856. The natives on the Maclay- 

 Coast complained about the sickness in the villages on the coast 

 which appeared soon after the destruction of Aralu. The sickness 

 amongst them, I believe, was the result of decomposition of animal 



(1) In the dialect of the Bongu of the Maclay-Coast tangrin means earth- 

 quake and boro, big. 



(2) I found the approximate year of this event by the inquiry : which 

 of the young men of the village was born at the time of the earthquake. 

 The man shown to me as being born soon after the destruction of Aralu, 

 could not be more (in August 1876) than about 20 years of age. 



