318 NEW GUINEA. [chap, xxxiv. 



to me. All tlie time I had been laid up the ship's crew 

 and the Javanese soldiers who had been brought in a 

 tender (a sailing ship which had arrived soon after the 

 Etna), had been employed cutting down, sawing, and split- 

 ting large trees for firewood, to enable the steamer to get 

 back to Amboyna if the coal-ship did not return ; and they 

 had also cleared a number of wide, straight paths through 

 the forest in various directions, greatly to the astonishment 

 of the natives, who could not make out what it all meant. 

 I had now a variety of walks, and a good deal of dead 

 wood on which to search for insects ; but notwithstanding 

 these advantages, they were not nearly so plentiful as I had 

 found them at Sarawak, or Amboyna, or Katchian, con- 

 firming my opinion that Dorey was not a good locality. 

 It is quite probable, however, that at a station a few miles 

 in the interior, away from the recently elevated coralline 

 rocks and the influence of the sea air, a much more abun- 

 dant harvest might be obtained. 



One afternoon I went on board the steamer to return 

 the captain's visit, and was shown some very nice sketches 

 (by one of the lieutenants), made on the south coast, and 

 also at the Arfak mountain, to which they had made an 

 excursion. From these and the captain's description, it 

 appeared that the people of Arfak were similar to those of 

 Dorey, and I could hear nothing of the straight-haired race 

 which Lesson says inhabits the interior, but which no one 



