9 



loose sand. Large blocks of coral, as it' just broken off from the reef, lie at 

 the water's edge, where the surf beats ceaselessly and the dip of the beach 

 is general!)' too steep for native praus to land without running the risk of 

 being smashed to pieces. It is the presence of landing-places, with good 

 water, whicli limits the stages in the tedious journey along the beach from 

 Andai to Sjari. 



The rivers in flowing into the sea either break up into many shifting 

 mouths or are barred by banks of sand or shingle into semi-lagoons, with 

 only a small exit to the sea. 



Most of the trees fringing the beach are prostrate or semi-prostrate, as if 

 torn up by the force of the waves. Stagnant lagoons, impenetrable bog, and 

 shallow standing water occur in parts, while the undergrowth is covered 

 and the ground strewn with seaweed, evidence of the retreating swirl of 

 great waves. The natives told me that when the north wind blows the 

 sea washes all over this belt of country, fish being often found stranded 

 on bushes far inland. 



The few small native ; 'campongs" are placed just above the beach, 

 whore sand-banks have accumulated, on which some Casuarinas mark the 

 permanence, as at Wariap and Waren. 



I returned from Wariap by the beach in December 1913, the first time 

 this journey had been made by a European, to be followed by Mr. Pratt in 

 April 1914, at the height of the north monsun. He described the whole 

 region as then more or less under water, the rivers, pouring down from the 

 mountains in floods, being beaten back over the land by the huge surf raised 

 by the north wind, which bars the exit of their waters to the sea. 



This interesting observation accounts for the shifting river mouths, and 

 also explains why the native habitations are generally so far from water and 

 so few in number. 



1. " KORANG " Ott CORAL-LIMESTONE ZONE. 



Behind the beach the low-lying belt of " korang," covered with forest, 

 stretches uniformly from the coast to the foot-hills of the Arfak, a sterile 

 porous formation showing so little depth of soil that it gives the impression 

 of walking over a reef. 



Rosenberg (10, 80) in 1870 refers to the recent appearance of this coral- 

 limestone area, which he concluded must be still rising, and he quotes the 

 older inhabitants of Andai as saying that they remembered low scrub where 

 the forest now stands. 



Van Gelder (20, 94) considers that a gradual rising of the whole of the 

 north coast of New Guinea is taking place, or a lowering of the sea-level, 

 which amounts to the same thing. He found evidence of this fact at 



