XI.] THE BED BIRD OF PARADISE. 263 



The coast patois I have abeady alluded to. It supplies, as it were, 

 the place of Malay as a general means of communication, and is in 

 use on the seaboard of the greater part of North-west New Guinea. 

 It appears to be Xufoor with an admixture of various foreign 

 words. But, in addition, most of the islands — "VYaigiou among the 

 number — have each a distinct language spoken by the coast dwellers, 

 which in its turn differs from that of the Alfuros or wild inhabitants 

 of the interior. I was unfortunate enough to lose the greater 

 portion of the vocabularies collected in AVaigiou, but the few words 

 I have given in the Appendix show sufficiently the distinctness of 

 these tlu*ee languages. 



These Alfuros were phtheirophagous, going over the dense mat 

 adorning their lieads with the most praiseworthy perseverance ; 

 layer after layer being worked through systematically with the aid 

 of a long bamboo comb. Their method of obtaining fire was new 

 to all of us, the spark being struck from the hard, siliceous exterior 

 of the bamboo and a fragment of pottery, which latter article they 

 liad probably obtained from the coast tribe. 



We searched the woods in vain for adult males of the Red Bird 

 of Paradise. Females and young males, which cannot be dis- 

 tinguished from one another, were to be met with tolerably 

 frequently, and we shot several, but of the lovely full-plumaged 

 male we never even caught a glimpse. We had nevertheless no 

 cause to grumble, for we succeeded later, and our cruise up the 

 gulf, short as it was, was so far fortunate in that it furnished us 

 witli specimens in nearly every stage of development, and before 

 we left the island we had a complete series, showing the various 

 changes in the plumage from the sober-coloured young bird to tlie 

 beautiful and quaintly ornamented adult. 



The Eed Bird of Paradise is, like Wilson's Diphyllodes, entirely 

 confined to the two islands of Batanta and Waigiou. It is an allied 

 species to the well-known Paradisea apoda of the Aru Islands, and 

 several other kinds,^ of which one of the most beautiful is a recently- 



^ Paradisea minor in Nortli-west New Guinea and the islands of Misol and Jobi ; 



