594 



there seems to have been belts of country where nobody would 

 have liked to venture. (^5) Again, there were some tracts of 

 country, or areas of economic importance, where several vil- 

 lages tried to exercise their economic rights, either in harmony 

 or in strife. Thus the small island of Abd'u, in Cloudy Bay 

 (now the seat of the Resident Magistrate of the South-Eastern 

 Division), has a stone quarry. This seems to have been used 

 by the Mailu islanders and by the Loupom people, and by 

 several other villages near Abd'u (Domdra and the non-Mailu 

 speaking communities in Cloudy Bay). Again the saga 

 swamps in Lea were used by the Mailu, the Loupom, and the 

 Magori (a non-Mdgi village), who were not always on friendly 

 terms with each other. So also the jungle near Greenaway 

 Point (Mogubo) was used by the Mailu for hunting and 

 getting wood, and it was the garden land of the Loupom . 



Thus, in the use of the most elementary necessities (access 

 to waterholes, use of wood and clay, and the right of free 

 passage), the land is open to the members of a village com- 

 munity to the exclusion of all others. The right to make 

 gardens is vested in the clan. Each clan makes its gardens 

 collectively within one enclosure, and each clan has its own 

 territory where it makes its gardens to the exclusion of the 

 other clans. This seems to be the general form of garden 

 land tenure. And my inquiries, made on several points on 

 the mainland (in Derehai, Boreho, and Banoro), led to the 

 same conclusion. As this is the general form of land tenure 

 among the Papuo-Melanesians, it may be assumed to be also 

 the case among the mainland Magi. I had, however, such poor 

 informants amongst these that I should have treated their data 

 with extreme caution had they not been confirmed by other 

 evidence. ('^6) 



In Loupom, I obtained better evidence, but this instance 

 seems to be exceptional. The members of the two main clans 

 of the Loupom. — Boimardi and Gohuduhu — make their gardens 

 communally, each clan making every year its own separate 



(45) Since the establishment of European rule things have been 

 considerably changed in this respect, as the natives are no longer 

 afraid of raids and ambushes. 



(46) The facts obtained about the Papuo-Melanesians of the 

 Central Division are perfectly convincing and clear. I have visited 

 a number of native garden lands, discussed the ownership in many 

 cases of new and old gardens, and drawn sketches of boundaries 

 and garden sites. I tried the same method of concrete instances 

 in Mailu district, but my informants spoke Motu poorh^ and 

 could hardly understand what I wanted, or else they were sus- 

 picious. Mr. Armit, the Resident Magistrate at Ahd'u, who has 

 been brought up in Papua, and knows the natives and their 

 customs intimately, gave me the same statement with regard to 

 the land tenure in the Mailu district. 



