president's address — SECTION F. 211 



time were enemies of the deceased, and in one way or another did 

 him bodily harm or caused his death. Large carvings of this kind at 

 times portray the life-story of the departed, especially the troubles 

 caused him by evil spirits, supposed to be embodied in certain animals. 

 It is not so very long ago that it was believed these carvings were mean- 

 ingless creations, emanating from the lurid phantasies of the carver. 

 Close investigation among the natives, and especially the carvers, 

 eventually brought me to the discovery of the meaning, and with it 

 to the discovery of the totem system. 



From northern New Ireland I shall now go across to New Hanover. 

 Here we again find the same system as in northern New Ireland, with 

 the same bird totems ; but underlying this is a wholly different classi- 

 fication, founded on the similarity of the lines of the inner face of the 

 hand. This latter system I consider to be the original one, but 

 gradually it has been influenced by the totem customs of northern New 

 Ireland, so that to-day the bird totem is interlinked with the classi- 

 fication according to the lines of the palm. I have tested this peculiar 

 palmistry at various times, and found that certain bird totems go 

 together with certain lines, and that the natives are able by the latter 

 to ascertain which is the bird totem of the person examined. I shall 

 recur to this palmistry further on. 



Leaving New Hanover and going west we reach the Admiralty 

 Islands, and once more the totem system. Here, however, it shows 

 a certain decay, and I attribute this to the fact that the group is in- 

 habited by three distinct tribes : the Usiai, whom I consider the original 

 tribe in the group ; the Matankor, who belong to a tribe originating 

 in Micronesia ; and the Moamer, who, without doubt, came across from 

 New Guinea. These three tribes have their original customs, but, in 

 intermarrying, the Moamer have impressed on the other tribes the 

 totem customs which they brought with them from their original 

 home, and, up to the present date, observe as rigidly as in the other 

 islands I have mentioned, and from which they draw the same conse- 

 quence in regard to marriage and descent. The Usiai and Matankor 

 are more lax in respect to the consequence, and the system withovit 

 doubt has been forced upon them by the warlike Moamer, who always 

 were, and still are, the predominating power in the group. 



Having traced the totem system so far to the west, let me now 

 return to the Gazelle Peninsula, and show how far the system is trace- 

 able from there to New Guinea and to the Solomon Islands. The Gazelle 

 Peninsula is divided between two entirely different tribes, the one 

 occupying the north-eastern part, of which I have spoken, and the other 

 the western and southern, which is known by the name of Baining. 

 Here we 'find no trace of totem, or of anything that can possibly be 

 compared to it ; in fact, the whole tribe stands on such a low step of 

 culture that it is by far the most primitive native tribe with which I have 

 ever come in contact. But as soon as we pass the narrow neck of land 

 connecting the Gazelle Peninsula with the main island of New Britain 

 we once more meet tribes with a well-developed totem system, closely 

 resembling the system of northern New Ireland. But, although the 



