TOWARDS THE UNEXPLORED 
helped by the villagers of the neighbouring chief, 
Kafulu. These came in to lenda hand for the sake 
of tobacco and other trade articles they needed. 
The best thatch to be obtained in Papua is the 
sago leaf, and of this the natives make roofs that 
are water-tight and very durable. At EKkeikei we 
adopted this method. Along the rafters of our house 
we ran horizontal bamboos, and instead of a ridge- 
pole roof we had two of these bamboos running from 
end to end a few inches apart. The frond of the 
sago leaf which we used for this purpose is at least 
4 feet long; it measures 6 inches at the base, and 
tapers to a point. To begin the thatch, one takes 
the leaf and bends it two-thirds away from the apex. 
One starts from the bamboo horizontal that les nearest 
the eaves, and hooks the leaf over, laying the pointed 
end out. On the next higher bamboo one hooks over 
another leaf, similarly folded, so that its long pointed 
end far overlaps the other, and so on until the ridge 
of the roof is reached. ‘The operation is thus repeated 
until the whole roof is thatched. The space between 
the two parallels which form the ridge-pole is finally 
covered with grass laid thickly across and across. 
The sago leaf is grooved laterally, and forms, as 
it were, a natural water-spout for carrying off the 
rain. 
So durable is this roof that after an absence of 
five months we found that our Ekeikei house was 
still water-tight. This thatch is, however, a great 
harbourage for cockroaches, and there must have been 
millions of them in our house. At night we could 
hear them rustling among the dry leaves. I could 
Ig! 
