222 LAND IN NEW GUINEA. 



we neared this point the sea became smoother, and 

 after passing it, which we did about ten o'clock, we 

 saw heavy breakers on the horizon to windward. 

 We carried three fathoms water all the way round 

 the point, but it is no doubt shoaler to windward, 

 where the sea breaks. In approaching the point, 

 we found that what we had at first taken for mode- 

 rately high land, was in fact a wood of very lofty 

 trees, growing on a dead flat scarcely above high 

 water mark. These appeared to be a very tall, 

 thin, straight species of mangrove. They grew 

 perfectly upright, with slender pole-like stems, 

 many of them full 100 feet in height, but, 

 from their leaves, and the naked matted roots 

 sprawling over the mud, they certainly appeared to 

 be mangroves. Inside the point was a straight 

 beach, running due north for about five miles, 

 fronted bv a low bank of black sand, on which we 

 saw several natives running. At the end of this a 

 deep bight opened to the N.W. and a creek ran up 

 inside the sand bank, cutting it off from the jungle 

 and wood of the main land. On the point of the 

 sand bank, twelve or fourteen men stood at the 

 edge of the water, armed with bows and arrows ; 

 while a small canoe, with six or eight people in it, 

 probably women, was paddling across the creek to 

 the jungle. After pausing to look about us, we 

 pulled for the sand spit ; and as soon as we were 

 near enough for them to see our white faces, the 

 natives retreated rapidly towards their canoe, which 



