Strange Sights in Far-away Papua 



563 



from 5 to 6 inches. On the stomach, to 

 the right, are two or three horizontal 

 scars, made by cutting or burning. These 

 are self-inflicted for superstitious reasons. 

 The lower part of the stomach is tightly 

 drawn in (often extremely tight) with 

 a coil of finely plaited fiber. This seems 

 to be worn for elegance alone, and tight- 

 lacing is a ruling fashion among the Tu- 

 geri dandies ; the tighter the lacing the 

 greater the dandy. From fifteen to six- 

 teen years of age the young men are 

 hopeless victims to fashion. The Tugeri 

 go barefoot, but wear grass anklets 

 adorned with shells, which rattle like 

 castanets, as they walk. I observed, how- 

 ever, no dances, although these, I under- 

 stand, are performed in their villages. 

 For decency's sake they wear a shell, after 

 the manner of the statuesque fig-leaf, and 

 their costume is completed by a necklace 

 of dog's teeth and small pieces of bone, 

 such treasures as a savage prizes. 



A strange part of the Tugeri's para- 

 phernalia was their extraordinary drums. 

 The bod}' of these, shaped like a dice- 

 box, was hewn out of a solid log, hol- 

 lowed, and curiously carved. Midway at 

 the narrowest point was a clumsy handle, 

 also hewn from the log. The drum-heads 

 are of lizard skin. The performer carries 

 the instrument by the handle in the left 

 hand and beats with his right. The noise 

 is prodigious. 



A UNIQUE TRADING VILLAGE; 



Leaving Dutch New Guinea, I pro- 

 ceeded down the coast to Port Moresby, 

 the seat of the British government of 

 New Guinea. From here I planned to 

 penetrate about 200 miles into the interior 

 and make a permanent camp among the 

 hills, in order to carry out the object of 

 my expedition — the collection of butter- 

 flies and moths. But before leaving the 

 coast I had an opportunity of seeing 

 something of a very interesting village, 

 Hanuabada, a sort of miniature Venice, 

 where all the houses are built on piles 

 over the water. The people of this vil- 

 lage annually send out a trading expe- 

 dition to a distance of several hundred 



miles to dispose of the pottery manu- 

 factured by them. 



For weeks before the annual trading 

 expedition Hanuabada is full of life. At 

 every turn one comes upon women 

 crouching on the ground, fashioning 

 lumps of clay into wonderfully perfect 

 pottery, for which the village is famous. 

 The men folk, although they do not con- 

 descend to take part in the actual fash- 

 ioning of the pots, are good enough to 

 dig the clay, which they take out of the 

 ground with a stone adze, a flat stone 

 iDlade lashed to the shorter extremity of 

 a forked stick, the longer extremity form- 

 ing the handle. 



There is a distinct organization of 

 labor among the potters, the women being- 

 divided into "makers" and "bakers." 

 Several "makers" work together in a 

 group. They use no wheel, but seize a 

 lump of clay with both hands and make 

 a hole large enough to get the right hand 

 in, whereupon they gradually give the 

 vessel its contour. After being roughlv 

 shaped, it is smoothed off with flat sticks 

 or the palm of the hand. The finished 

 article of Hanuabada ware is in the form 

 of a flattened sphere with a very wide 

 mouth and a neatly finished rim six or 

 eight inches across. Farther to the east, 

 along the coast, the pottery is highly deco- 

 rated, but it is much more crude in form 

 and has no fine rim. The pots are dried 

 in the sun for several days, and then they 

 are turned over to the "bakers," whose 

 fires are blazing in every street. There 

 are two methods of baking : one is to lay 

 the pot on a heap of hot ashes : the other 

 to build the fire right around it. The 

 vessel is watched through the whole pro- 

 cess, and is continually turned on the fire 

 with a little stick thrust into the mouth. 



When -many hundreds of pots have 

 been completed the Hanuabada people 

 begin to think about the disposal of their 

 wares. Their great market is at Paruru, 

 a long way up the coast. They barter 

 their pottery for sago with the nations 

 of that district, and it is very curious 

 to note that this extensive trading organi- 

 zation on the part of an utterly savage 



