BRITISH NEW GUINEA. 437 



that neighbourhood changes and variations occur, so that at 

 the head of the Gi'eat Papuan Gulf, and in the Fly Basin, 

 the Motu language is a foreign tongue. The same also 

 applies to the eastern end, and to the islands adjacent thereto, 

 where the philological variations are numerous and conflict- 

 ing. While the peo])le met with in the highland zones of 

 the Owen Stanley Range spoke a dialect akin to that of the 

 coast Papuans, those encountered on the Upper Fly River 

 expressed themselves in a tongue every word of which ap- 

 parently differed from that spoken by the tribes of the lower 

 regions, and from that spoken by any known coastal com- 

 munity, notwithstanding that the people themselves exhibited 

 no distinctive characteristics of race, the only marked contrast 

 being in lightness of colour. In the western division the 

 same diversification of speech is met with, where neighl)ouring 

 tribes are unable to hold intercourse one with the other, even 

 if friendly, by reason of incompatibility of language. No 

 doubt this may in some measure be accounted for by local 

 environment, constant civil intertribal war being the means of 

 isolating communities, so that no friendly intercourse is held, 

 by reason of which, together with other attendant causes, an 

 incongruity of language may have unknowingly been estab- 

 lished. Of the ethnography of these natives we do not as yet 

 possess sufficient data with which to elucidate that interesting 

 branch of knowledge ; its elaboration must therefore be left 

 to future generalisation. 



Fauna. 



The Papuan fauna is of a fairly representative character ; 

 it includes no big game, such as that met with in Africa and 

 India, but its avifauna rivals that of any other part of the 

 world. Of animals, those chiefly to be found in the Papuan 

 land are the wild and domestic pigs and dogs, the tree 

 kangaroos {Dendrolagus dorianus), wallabies, cuscus, cats, 

 rats, mice, (Bita), and other representatives of less note. 

 The pigs are animals of great value to the native in- 

 habitants ; they are fondled and petted like children, the 

 young being sometimes suckled at the breasts of the 

 women, an abominable practice in itself, and greatly in- 

 tensified when associated with participating infants. The 

 market value of the pig is occasionally equal to that of a 

 human being. Some of the dogs are almost, if not wholly 

 identical with the Australian dingo ; those met with on the 

 Upper Fly River being of a bright orange colour, and some- 



