A WIDE VIEW 239 



The greater part of the next day was spent in cutting 

 a way along the ridge to a point (5800 ft.) from which 

 it was hoped that a view of the country might be seen. 

 Long before the track was cut the clouds were down 

 upon us, and no view could be seen, so we decided to 

 stay for another day, although w^e had only one day's 

 food remaining. But the view that we saw on the 

 following day was more than compensation for our 

 rather scanty fare. 



Due North of us, and rising from the spur on which 

 we stood, was the great mass of Mount Godman, and 

 to the West of that the even more imposing peak of 

 Wataikwa Mountain (9923 ft.). Between the two 

 could be seen a part of the tremendous cliffs of Mount 

 Leonard Darwin (13,882), the southern face of which 

 appears to show an almost vertical precipice of upwards 

 of ten thousand feet. To the West ridge beyond ridge 

 of forest-covered heights stretched away to the ranges 

 of the Charles Louis Mountains in the far distance. 

 To the East rose the beautiful three-topped mountain 

 called the Cock's Comb (10,050 ft.), behind and to the 

 North of which heavy banks of clouds showed where 

 the snows of Mount Carstensz lay hidden. Five thousand 

 feet below us the mountains ended almost abruptly, 

 and the southern half of the circuit of our view was 

 occupied by the hideous plain of dull green jungle to a 

 hazy line of the sea forty miles away. Here and there 

 the sunlight caught the waters of innumerable rivers, 

 and we could distinctly see those that we had crossed, 

 the Tuaba, Kamura, Wataikwa, and the Iwaka. Further 

 to the East was a still bigger river, the Wania, which we 



