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THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 
qualities. The chief of Wild Island had considerable power; he took articles away 
from men to whom they were given, and made arrangements for each man of a party 
getting a hatchet. He never paddled himself, and he pushed canoes out of the way 
when approaching the ship. He, however, clamoured with the rest for presents and 
trade. No ceremonious respect was paid to him at all, and he here is termed chief 
merely because he evidently took the lead whenever present. 
The natives seemed friendly enough, but they were of course greatly excited 
at our presence and probably were afraid of us. When a party, which landed with 
Captain Thomson on D’Entrecasteaux Island, was putting off from shore in a small boat 
to reach the pinnace, the inhabitants seemed possibly to be meditating an attack, for 
they suddenly produced their lances and showed intense excitement ; the sight of a 
sack full of trade articles in the boat was possibly almost too tempting for them. 
The members of the Expedition were usually on very good terms with them. On 
one occasion Mr. R. Richards, Paymaster of the Challenger, accompanied a number of 
natives in the chiefs canoe, who were guiding a party to Pigeon Island ; he took down 
the names of the whole crew. 
The natives were very much frightened at some goats which were offered to them by 
Captain Thomson, and refused to let them be landed on the inhabited islands. They 
were very much scared also by a wooden jointed toy snake which was shown them 
swaying to and fro, and evidently must be acquainted with poisonous snakes, as thej; 
made signs for the thing to be killed lest it should injure some one. A squeaking 
doll, which kicked its legs and arms about, frightened the chief Oto very much, and 
he and others made signs at once to have it put out of their sight. 
With regard to the population of the islands, it was estimated that the population of 
Wild Island was about 400 or 500, and that of D’Entrecasteaux Island about 250 or 
300. 
The Admiralty Islanders, like many other Melanesians, for instance the New Cale- 
donians, Loyalty Islanders, and apparently the New Britain and New Ireland races, have 
no bows and arrows, and the same is the case with the natives of the southeast of New 
Guinea ; bows and arrows seeming to commence on the coast only about Humboldt 
Bay, but all seem to have slings or other additional means of defence. 
The only domestic animals possessed by the natives of the Admiralty Islands in any 
abundance are pigs. These are partly kept in enclosures around the houses, and partly run 
half wild over the inhabited islands. They are small, lean, and black coloured, and 
never appear to develop large tusks. 1 No ornaments of large pigs’ tusks were seen in the 
1 Four skulls of the Admiralty Island Pigs were sent to Oxford to the late Prof. Rolleston, who refers to them in 
his Memoirs on the Domestic Pig of Prehistoric Times in Britain, Trans. Linn. Soc. Loncl. (Zool.), ser. 2, vol. i., 1876, 
reprinted in his collected Scientific Papers and Addresses, edited by Prof. Turner, Oxford, 1884. Dr. Rolleston states 
that these skulls had an eminence in the middle frontal line over an area homologous with the human glabella. In 
Sus papuensis this eminence is rudimentary. 
