94 A NATURALIST IN CANNIBAL LAND 



lightning in particular was most alarming. It played 

 around the boat as a cat plays with her paws around 

 a mouse. Stroke after stroke seemed to just miss 

 our little craft as it staggered and sobbed through the 

 sea. At times I could smell the sulphur (or rather 

 ozone) of the lightning flashes. But it all ended with 

 the morning and we got safely to Samarai. 



I was fortunate, by the way, to have finished on 

 Rossel Island at the time I did, as just after I had left 

 news came through that of three boat-loads of boys 

 (about one hundred) taken from Rossel Island to 

 Mombare, all had died but about ten. Men and boys 

 were dying there then at a dreadful rate from dysen- 

 tery. If I had been on the spot at Rossel Island at 

 the time when the news came through, possibly the 

 natives would have made a victim of me as a measure 

 of part requital. That is their way. If they blame 

 the white man for any evil that has befallen them they 

 are anxious to wreak vengeance on any white man 

 who is handy. To a very inconvenient extent their 

 ideas make each white man his brother's keeper. 



From Samarai I went back to Cooktown for a long 

 spell. By this time I had become fairly well used 

 to the ways of exploration in the South Sea Islands. 

 I could navigate a little, at any rate I knew enough 

 not to venture out to sea without compass and charts. 

 I was beginning to understand the ways of the natives, 

 and I was beginning to feel my feet financially. At 

 Cooktown I was married, and my wife and I stayed 



