480 



The National Geographic Magazine 



PAPUAN CHILDREN 



The children are at home in the water at a very early age. They often paddle about alone in 



tiny dug-out canoes of their own 



mous mops made of cassowary feathers 

 stuck to them. 



A word about New Guinean canoes is 

 in order here. They vary among the dif- 

 ferent tribes as do all the other products 

 of their handicraft. In some places they 

 have a single outrigger, in others two. 

 At Djamna and the Humboldt Bay they 

 are elaborately decorated with figures 

 at bow and stern, and often with conven- 

 tional designs burned on the hull repre- 

 senting sharks and flying fishes. Here 

 again the photos show better than verbal 

 descriptions the way these crafts are put 

 together and their varying types. The 

 basis of all is a great hollow log prepared 

 with fire, and often still with the primi- 

 tive stone axe. To the sides of this are 

 sewn two strips of wood, which go to 

 form the gunwales. In almost every 

 case where the canoes are sailed, sails 

 made of woven pandannus leaves are 

 used. A tripod generally serves as a 

 mast among the Geelvink Bay islands. 

 The paddles of this region are short-han- 

 dled and devoid of ornamentation, while 

 at Humboldt Bay they are long, so that a 

 man may paddle standing. Here also 

 they are often most beautifully carved. 



For weapons the bow and arrow are 

 general. In some places they are as elab- 



orate as human ingenuity can devise, the 

 arrow shafts decorated with burned and 

 incised designs, ornamented with tufts of 

 feathers, often from the Birds of Para- 

 dise, and with tips of bone or burnt 

 wood. These tips are elaborately carved 

 with many series of barbs and are cer- 

 tainly savage-looking weapons. 



They are not knowingly poisoned, but 

 we are told that they are thrust into the 

 body of a dead warrior and left to absorb 

 some of his valor. The valor is doubt- 

 less most effective in causing in this damp 

 equatorial climate swift and sure blood- 

 poisoning. 



Spears are often used, as well as ar- 

 rows. Some are bamboo, like great 

 cheese scoops, while others are tipped 

 with human bones or the shin-bones of 

 cassowaries. Shields occur sporadically 

 and not many of the tribes in Dutch terri- 

 tory know of them. The people of Wiak 

 make them long and narrow for parry- 

 ing; they have crude designs daubed on 

 them with native pigments, and on top 

 they are surmounted with a grinning face 

 and mop of cassowary feathers for hair. 

 Daggers are only known in Humboldt 

 Bay. They are made of thigh bones, 

 usually, splintered to a sharp point on 

 one end, with the other end worked 



