434 COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
similar practice, to which reference has been made, occurs 
in some parts of Borneo. 
New Britain is 350 miles in length, and like New 
Ireland very narrow, but more irregular in shape. Its 
northern coast-line is still very imperfectly known, and 
is beset by many outlying islands; the south coast is 
bold and abrupt throughout its entire extent. The 
north-eastern end of the island terminates in the Gazelle 
Peninsula, and here the evidences of volcanic activity are 
most marked. Commanding Blanche Bay, at the very 
extremity of the island, are the peaks known as the 
Mother and Daughters, two of which are active. In 
May, 1878, a volcano suddenly arose in the bay, and close 
by is a hot-water river, up which a boat can be rowed 
for several hundred yards, the water in many places 
being actually boiling. The district is nevertheless very 
thickly inhabited, and there are small European settle¬ 
ments on Matupi Island and the mainland, as well as at 
the neighbouring Mioko on the Duke of York group. 
Here are the stations of the New Guinea Company, the 
Deutsche Handels und Plantagen Gesellschaft, and an 
American firm, while a dozen or so of individual traders 
lead a struggling existence in this and neighbouring 
localities, copra being the chief export. The Administra¬ 
tion owns three steamers, and there is a six-weekly 
communication with the Netherlands India ships at 
Batavia. The New Guinea Company and the Wesleyan 
and Boman Catholic missionaries have exercised a certain 
amount of influence upon the people in this district, who 
now begin to be ashamed of their cannibal habits, and 
themselves attempt in a certain measure to put down 
crime, bringing in the delinquents for judgment to the 
Germans; but the bulk of the natives are complete 
savages—a race of totally naked cannibals. They are 
