192 PYGMIES AND PAPUANS 



as that necessitated cutting down a number of big trees, 

 but now that a great many of them have the steel axes, 

 which we gave them, it is to be hoped that they have 

 learnt to place their dwelhngs in safer positions, even 

 though it costs them a little extra labour. 



The wet season, which we hoped had reached its 

 maximum of wetness in July, when sometimes for 

 days together the rain hardly ceased, continued in a 

 series of greater or less floods through the months of 

 August and September. Often it was impossible to 

 move a yard from the camp, and without books life 

 would have been almost insupportable. On one of 

 the wettest of those days I came across the follow- 

 ing passage, which seemed to describe the situation 

 exactly : — 



"With five . . . what we call qualities of bad, 

 Worse, worst, and yet worse still, and still worse yet." 



It need hardly be said that this very disagreeable 

 season produced ill effects on all the members of the 

 expedition. The Europeans became depressed, and if 

 we were not sick of hfe itself, we were certainly sick of 

 New Guinea, while in the case of the coolies and soldiers, 

 who were accustomed to sunnier climates, and who had 

 no interest or goal to look forward to in the country, the 

 results were disastrous indeed. Hardly a man escaped 

 fever of greater or less severity and chills brought on by 

 the unceasing rain and the consequent impossibility of 

 securing a change of dry clothing Several men suffered 

 too from dysentery of a very intractable type, which 

 completely incapacitated them from any further service. 



But worse than either fever or dysentery was the 



