114 THE PAPUANS: COMPARATIVE NOTES, ETC., 
becoming entangled in the animal’s powerful tusks, enables the 
native to spear or club the boar with comparatively little danger. 
But it certainly requires great nerve to quietly await such a 
charge. 
The cuscus is also eagerly sought for and eaten, ornaments 
being prepared from its skin. 
The Darnley Islanders used to hang up the bodies of their 
dead relatives, tap them, and then drink the juices of the 
putrefying carcass. Now, however, the missionaries of the 
L.M.S. have altered all this. 
The practice of eating or drinking portions of deceased 
friends is still in vogue in different parts of the Island, more as 
a proof of affection than from any cannibalistic motive. 
Cannibalism I believe to be the result of meat-hunger, com- 
bined with a disinclination to waste anything edible, and not 
as is so often affirmed, the prompting of a fierce and blood- 
thirsty nature. 
The people of Moresby Island are cannibals, yet I lived 
among them and invariably found them gentle, obliging, and 
affectionate. 
At Murray Island the Papuans consider grey hair shameful, 
and wear wigs to hide the signs of age. 
The Rev. James Chalmers in his recently published work on 
New Guinea’ expresses his opinion that the coast tribes have 
driven back the original holders of the littoral inland, being 
robuster than they. 
I cannot coincide with the reverend gentleman’s opinion. If 
this were the case, the coast tribes would scarcely live in such 
constant dread of the bushmen. They occupy houses built on 
piles to which their canoes are fastened ready for an emergency. 
I cannot see any reason for imagining that the inland tribes 
originally occupied the coast line, we find no legends among 
1Life and Adventure in New Guinea. Chalmers and Gill, 1885. 
