444 STUDIES, SCIENTIFIC AND SOCIAL chap. 



of bamboo are made use of. On the north-west and 

 south-west coasts, where the people have long been in 

 communication with Malay traders, they have iron tools 

 and weapons, and cultivate also maize and a little rice and 

 millet, and have the papaya as an additional fruit and 

 vegetable ; and they also grow tobacco, of which the}^ 

 make huge cigars. At Dorey they have learnt to work 

 iron, and make swords and choppers as well as iron points 

 to their arrows and spears. 



The daily food of these people consists of some of the 

 vegetables already named, of which they have a pretty 

 constant supply, together with fruits, fish, and occasion- 

 ally the flesh of the wild pig, the cuscus, or of birds caught 

 in snares or shot with arrows. They also eat shell-fish, 

 lizards, and almost every kind of large insect, especially 

 beetles and their larvae, * which are eaten either raw or 

 cooked. Having no salt, they mix sea-water with that in 

 which they cook their food, and this is so highly esteemed 

 that the people of the hills carry away bamboos full of 

 salt water whenever they visit the coast. 



The plantations are usually made at some distance 

 inland for safety, and after the ground is cleared and 

 fenced by the men, the cultivation is left almost wholly to 

 the women, who go every day to weed and bring home 

 some of the produce for the evening's meal. They have 

 throughout the year a succession of fruits and vegetables 

 either wild or cultivated, and are thus never half-starved 

 like the Australians. On the whole the women are well 

 treated and have much liberty, though they are considered 

 as inferiors, and do not take their meals with the men. 

 The children are well attended to, and the fathers seem 

 very fond of their boys, and often take them when very 

 young on their fishing or hunting excursions. 



As in the case of most other savages, we have very 

 different and conflicting accounts of the character of the 

 Papuans. Mr. Windsor Earl well remarks, that, whenever 

 civilized man is brought into friendly communication 

 with savages, the disgust which naturally arises from the 

 first glance at a state of society so obnoxious to his sense 

 of propriety, disappears before a closer acquaintance, and 



