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NATURE 



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EXPLORATIONS AND ADVENTURES IN 

 NEW GUINEA. 



Explorations and Adventures in New Guinea. By- 

 Captain John Strachan, F.R.G.S., F.R.C.I. (London: 

 Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1888.) 



HE terrce incognito? of the world are year by year 

 growing less ; but of these the vast island continent 

 of New Guinea remains as to much of its coasts, and 

 almost all of its mountain regions, still scantily known 

 and explored. The elegantly bound volume under review 

 is the latest contribution to our knowledge of the shores 

 of this tripartite country. To the explorer who adven- 

 tures himself into this most insalubrious territory, even if 

 he bring back with him but small additions, we are under 

 a debt of gratitude, if so be, however, that his record be 

 trustworthy, and an honest attempt to add to science 

 geographical or biological. 



Captain Strachan is a master mariner, who appears to 

 have spent several years on the New Guinea coasts, in 

 command of small trading vessels, engaged in the 

 collection of such commercial products as are to be 

 obtained from the natives, and has made a bid for fame 

 by combining with his ordinary pursuits the role of 

 explorer. The narrative before us it would be unfair to 

 submit to too rigid a criticism as a literary production, 

 especially as the author disclaims the intention of aspiring 

 to " literary renown," but relates his experiences in the 

 " homely language of a British sailor." Deprived of the 

 expectation of a literary delicacy, the reader has a right 

 to hope for a more or less satisfying portion of new facts 

 and observations, as the raison d'etre of the work. 



The book divides itself into two portions : explorations in 

 the Papuan Gulf within the British Protectorate ; and in 

 Macluer Inlet (or Gulf, as Mr. Strachan not inappro- 

 priately calls it) in the Dutch territory in the north-west. 



In the Papuan Gulf, Mr. Strachan claims to have 

 ascended the Mia Kasa river, and to have discovered and 

 explored Strachan Island and Strachan Country, a region 

 lying to the immediate west of the Fly River. He has 

 discovered also a large arm of the Mia Kasa, christened 

 by him the Prince Leopold River, which incloses, and is 

 the western boundary of, Strachan Island. The name 

 Prince Leopold River, he has applied also to the Mia 

 Kasa above its junction. Beyond the mere statement, 

 "the Mia Kasa itself was discovered by Dr. Samuel 

 Macfarlane as far back as 1877, and was named by 

 him the Baxter," Mr. Strachan makes no reference to the 

 previous exploration of the river made, not in 1877 but in 

 1875, by that missionary, who ascended it for sixty miles 

 in the Ellengowan steamer, and for thirty miles farther in 

 one of his ship's boats. This is as far as, if not farther 

 than, the point attained by Mr. Strachan. If therefore a 

 new name had to be applied, only the western arm, now 

 first brought to our knowledge, ought to bear the name 

 Prince Leopold, while the river explored by Mr. Mac- 

 farlane should be known as the Mia Kasa or Baxter. 

 Even the Prince Leopold River is indicated in Mac- 

 farlane' s map. Mr. Strachan has indicated a number of 

 diverticula extending right and left from both rivers, but 

 he adds little, beyond stating it, to the opinion, long held, 

 though yet without absolute proof, that the Mia Kasa and 

 all its affluents are merely canals of the vast delta system 



of the Fly River. If Mr. Strachan had taken the trouble 

 to examine the work of his predecessors, he could scarcely 

 have deluded himself on entering the mouth of its 

 estuary with such fancies as these : " During the whole 

 day I could not help thinking that we were not sailing on 

 a river at all ; but were on an arm of the sea, which 

 would, in all probability, extend across the whole island 

 from south-east to north-west, opening into the Arafura 

 Sea at that part known to the Dutch as the Utanata 

 River ; and I built a good many castles in the air in 

 consequence, hoping we had found a new channel to 

 China and the East " ! It is sufficient to state that the 

 Utanata River rises in the gorges of the Charles Lewis 

 Range, so that the water-way surmised by Mr. Strachan 

 to exist must cross the spurs of that range. Nor has 

 he any better basis for many of his beliefs, none of which 

 appears more unfounded than that given on p. 278, 

 where a river " debouching into the Arafura Sea opposite 

 Providential Bank, will, I believe, be found connected 

 with the Fly River at its junction with the Alice River, 

 discovered by D'Albertis"! This new river would neces- 

 sarily bisect his new channel to China ! We have unfor- 

 tunately no means of testing the accuracy of the author's 

 positions. He does not tell us on what base his survey is 

 constructed ; or whether it is established by astronomical 

 observations, or from assumed points on the Admiralty 

 chart fixed by sextant angles or prismatic bearings, so as to 

 gain his reader's confidence in his discoveries. On p. 41 

 he refers to a large tributary as being "ninety miles 

 inland which I named the Wallace"; while on p. 128, 

 he says, " at a distance of some eighty miles the Prince 

 Leopold again divides into two branches, the eastern of 

 which is the Wallace," " which we followed [p. 42] for a 

 distance of seventy miles through the same class of 

 country." If we test this distance by his map, we find 

 that a chain thirty-five miles in length, would extend from 

 the mouth of the Wallace River to beyond the Fly River. 

 These discrepancies do not increase our confidence in the 

 accuracy of Mr. Strachan's explorations. He describes 

 the country in this region in the most glowing terms, 

 " splendid agricultural country," " well watered," " high 

 land." Other travellers have reported it as " low and 

 swampy," while D'Albertis in ascending the Fly, found 

 the whole country for some hundreds of miles low and 

 little elevated above the sea. Such glowing advertise- 

 ments are to be gravely deprecated, of a region so 

 malarious that few Europeans can ever be able to settle in it 

 as their home ; it is doubtful whether they could even find 

 it habitable during the wet season. While abundance of 

 unoccupied territory exists in Australia, richer in soil and 

 easier of access, and in a far less unhealthy climate, no 

 wise man will risk his capital and his life in the great 

 delta of the Fly River. The natives at the mouth of the 

 Mia Kasa seem to have so threatened the little party, that 

 they had to abandon their lugger, and make for the coast 

 overland, experiencing some hardships by the way, and 

 eventually the loss of one of their companions by drown- 

 ing. We fear few will be able to appreciate Mr. Strachan's 

 delicacy in forbidding, "in order to prevent raising a 

 hostile spirit among the natives," his " weary, worn and 

 starving people," from cutting down a cocoa nut tree, 

 during their retreat, shortly after they had been firing on 

 its owners with their Winchesters, discharging rockets in 



