BY WILLIAM E. ARMIT, F.L.S., F.R.G.S. 91 
They outnumber the coast tribes, and are, in many respects, 
superior to them, morally and physically. 
But even in a given tribe the explorer invariably finds so 
many individual variations from what he considers the typical 
form, that he becomes sorely puzzled to form any distinct idea— 
unless, indeed, he remembers that even in a crowd of Europeans 
the same diversity of form is, invariably, found, ranging from 
the dolycocephalic to the brachycephalic type, and including 
innumerable variations and aberrations from either type. 
Prognathous and orthognathous people are met with at every 
turn, and yet no one doubts fora moment that they belong to 
one and the same race. The same remarks apply to colour. 
Many white men approximate very closely to Creoles—using the 
term in its present acceptation—yet no one would care to inform 
them that they had a strain of black blood in their veins. 
I think, therefore, that it only tends to complicate matters if 
we take note of every shade of colour, or peculiar formation of 
cranium, met with in New Guinea. The fact that for centuries, 
perhaps for ages, the Papuans have been separated throughout 
the length and breadth of the Island into numerous distinct 
tribes—nearly every one of which has its own dialect, its own 
habits and customs, differing in a greater or lesser degree from 
those of its neighbours, with whom a constant, or almost con- 
stant, though desultory war is carried on—accounts for many 
of the variations, which are so noticeable at present. 
Had we found New Guinea governed by one independent 
sovereign, forming one nation instead of hundreds of indepen- 
dent tribes, speaking one language instead of, as at present, 
numerous dialects, we should not hesitate to own them as one 
race. Now, however, we speak of black, brown, and white 
Papuans, of Alfuros, of the indigenes of the interior, as if these 
were all distinct races; and to further complicate matters, Mr. 
Ranken talks of Mahori invaders—a collective name adopted to 
include a mythical wave of conquerors from the eastern race of 
