40 A NATURALIST IN CANNIBAL LAND 



the natives more savage than they really are. But 

 one must have some rules of life. 



As regards the climate, to take with one a stock 

 of whisky or any other spirits is to invite trouble 

 and to have the invitation promptly accepted. 

 Possibly some people can take alcohol in moderation 

 in tropical climates without serious harm to their 

 health. But the trouble is that when out in the 

 wilderness, lonely and without distraction, modera- 

 tion soon drifts into immoderation. It is extremely 

 difficult to be a strictly moderate drinker when you 

 are the only white man in a forest camp or a trading 

 hut, a week's journey from the next white man. 

 The safest course is to have no supply of alcohol at 

 all, except what maybe carried as medicine and used 

 only as medicine. 



Apart from caution in regard to alcohol I think 

 that the most necessary thing in the tropics is to 

 take a great deal of exercise. The chance of a lazy 

 life of course never came my way, so that I was 

 never tempted to loaf. But I have seen enough to 

 conclude that it is the man who is afraid to sweat 

 whose liver hardens or who falls ill in a tropical 

 climate. An exaggerated fear of the sun causes 

 more illness than it wards off. 



On my first voyage to New Guinea I had still 

 practically everything to learn in regard to the 

 customs of the country and the precautions which 

 it was necessary to take against disease. But now 



