278 RETURN OF THE NATIVES. 



adapted for those purposes. I can only conjecture 

 that the scoop is for extracting the pith of the sago- 

 palm, and the loop is probably used for holding the 

 junk of palm while the scoop is pushed into it. 



Everything we saw ashore— the large sheltered 

 houses raised above the ground, the dry firewood 

 stored in them, the sticks and bushes on the path- 

 ways, &c., denotes the climate to be a very wet one, 

 and in all our excursions into New Guinea, we found 

 almost continual rain. 



As soon as we had got on board the Prince George, 

 we saw about a dozen natives in the large house 

 again, walking about apparently to see what damage 

 we had done. I am afraid they must have thought 

 us a shocking set of buccaneering savages. They 

 seemed to be pointing with great surprise to our 

 foot-marks, wondering no doubt what had become 

 of our toes, and at the extraordinary shaped feet 

 they must have concluded we had from the im- 

 pressions of our shoes. There were two or three 

 women among them, one of whom had an infant. 

 Two of these went into one of the smaller houses, 

 which were open in front,* and seemed to occupy 

 it as their home, looking about to see if their 



* Forrest, in hi* voyage to New Guinea in the last century, 

 when he visited Doree, in the north-west corner of the island, 

 gives a slight account of two sorts of houses, similar to those 

 we had now seen on the south-east side. He says, the long 

 large houses are inhabited by the married people and the 

 unmarried women ; and that the young men and bachelors only 

 live in the smaller square houses. From what I saw to-day, this 

 docs not seem to be the case here. 



