1893.] Geography and Travel. 467 
villages which were built upon piles for security are now removed to 
dry land. The want of recognized hereditary chiefs among the natives 
resent causes some difficulty, but the coast tribes have to a great 
extent accepted the change, and the inland tribes, who were for the 
most part driven inland by the coast residents, are commencing to 
come in. The area of the British portion is 86,000 square miles, and 
the population is probably 350,000. On their part the Germans are 
doing similar work. Between Pouro and Milne bays there is a ridge 
of lava and coral limestone, rising to 850 feet. The close relationship 
often supposed to exist between the flora of New Guinea and that of 
Australia seems scarcely borne out by the facts. Though Proteaceæ 
and Myrtacee abound in the savannahs of Fly River, yet the palms 
are numerous in species, and at least fifty indigenous plants are 
known. 
Sir W. Macgregor has been specially engaged among the D’Entre- 
casteaux and Trobriand Islands. The latter are a little known group 
of small islets, with one language, and a population of some 15,000, 
The most interesting discovery has been that of a number of atolls 
which have, since their formation, been elevated by a horizontal uplift. 
Kitava or Nowan has a surface of 5.6 square miles, and is now girt 
by a fringing reef: almost its whole circuit is surrounded by a low 
sloping margin about a quarter of a mile wide, covered with trees. 
This abuts against a steep coral wall three to four hundred feet in 
height, also covered with forest. Within this wall the land dips gently 
to a plateau fifty to a hundred feet below the edge of the wall, plainly 
the ancient lagoon. The soil in this interior plain is of a rich choco- 
late tint, and very fertile. All the natives reside in this protected 
area, which is drained by filtration through the porous coral rock. 
Kwaiwata is similar, but much smaller. Gawa is a still more perfect 
specimen, having a coral wall four hundred feet high, and so steep 
that it must beclimbed by ladders, while the interior is a 100 feet 
lower. On approaching these islands from the sea they seem to be 
uninhabited, since the natives live in the saucer-like hollow. In Iwa 
the raised border has been worn away. A great portion of the south 
of Fergusson Island, one of the D’Entrecasteaux group, is occupied by 
the mountain mass of Edagwaba, 4-5000 feet high, composed of mica 
schist, and in the N. W. corner Kubioia rises to 3-4000 feet. The 
islets of Namu and Bagiagia are of coral, low and uninhabited. On 
each of the small Trobriand Islands there is a single village. 
