SOCIETY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN. 23 



ing a Government party during a partial ascent of the Bensbach River 

 forming the Anglo-Dutch boundary, and to the officers of this party 

 thanks are due for much courtesy and consideration. Three whale- 

 boats were towed by the steam launch Ruby. 



West of Bugi the country is a vast flat swampy plain presenting 

 for the most part a uniform edge of mangrove swamp to the sea, 

 broken only by the mouths of sluggish rivers and creeks whose banks 

 are as a rule covered with mangrove in the lower reaches. Here and 



146 1*8 150 192 



Fig. 1. Map showing boundaries of British and German New Guinea. 



there, however, a sandy foreshore occurs, as is the case at Wallarter 

 Point, the eastern extremity of Jerai Bay, where behind a sand beach 

 there rises to a height of about four feet a plain of loosely compacted 

 sand and grit from the edge of which we obtained recent semi-fossil 

 shells of land and marine genera, Heli,r, Area and Ceritkium. Some 

 forty miles west of Wallarter Point the mouth of the Bensbach River 

 appears as a break in the green-grey mangrove line, which hitherto 

 had stretched as far as the eye could see, marking the junction of 



