STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE 153 



neither make nor possess an}^ metal and who have no 

 knowledge of pottery. The only vessels that they have 

 for holding water are scraped-out coconuts and simple 

 pieces of bamboo. Water boiling they had never seen 

 before we came among them. Their implements and 

 weapons are, as I have shown, of the most primitive 

 kind, and their ornaments are of the rudest possible 

 description. 



Cultivation of the soil is only practised by the people 

 of one or two villages, and even then it produces but a 

 very small proportion of their food, so it follows that 

 most of their time and energies are devoted to procuring 

 the necessaries of life. 



The struggle for existence is keen enough, the birth- 

 rate is low and the rate of infant mortality is, I believe, 

 very high. Nor do diseases spare them ; syphilis is 

 exceedingly prevalent, and was probably introduced by 

 Chinese and Malay traders to the West end of the island, 

 whence it has spread along the coast. Tuberculosis is 

 happily absent, but two natives of Wakatimi were suffer- 

 ing from what appeared to be certainly leprosy. Skin 

 diseases, notabh" tinea imbricata, are very common ; and 

 almost every person appears to suffer occasionally from 

 fever of one sort or another. 



But in spite of all these drawbacks the Papuans of the 

 Mimika are not such a very miserable people. They are 

 strong, those of them that survive the ordeals of infancy 

 and sickness ; they have food in plenty to eat, if they 

 choose to exert themselves sufficiently to obtain it ; they 

 have their amusements, songs and dances ; and the manner 

 of their lives is suited to the conditions of the country 



