Pygmies & Papuans: The Stone Age To-day in Dutch New Guinea

by A. F. R. Wollaston

TYPES OF TAPIRO PYGMIES.

DUTCH EXPEDITION

The Dutch expedition came down to us in detachments during the three days that we waited at the mouth of the river. There were Captain Van der Bie, in command; Mr. J. M. Dumas, surveyor and naturalist; three white sergeants, about fifty native soldiers and convicts, and twenty Dayaks of Dutch Borneo, who came down the river in the long canoes they had built themselves. There was also an Australian collector, Mr. Meek and two assistants, who had been attached to the Dutch expedition to make collections of birds and butterflies for a private museum in England. With Mr. Meek were ten natives of Port Moresby in British New Guinea, little brown, fuzzy-headed fellows full of life and merriment; they were in every way so different from the sombre and unemotional Papuans that it was difficult to realise that they were both natives of the same island.

The Utakwa expedition had been in the country for seven months and had traversed a considerable extent of country, but those months coincided with the period of the worst weather—one cannot talk of wet and dry seasons in that region—and like us they had suffered from the shortcomings of their coolies; the Dayaks had reached them too late to be of much service to the expedition. From their base camp at the head of steam-launch navigation they had gone two days further up the river in canoes, and then had gone a distance of seven marches towards Mount Carstensz. The furthest point they reached was at an altitude of about 3000 feet, and was less than twenty miles distant from the snow, but the views of the country that they saw were not sufficient to show whether that was the best route to the highest mountains. One of the principal objects of the Government in despatching that expedition to the Utakwa was to discover a convenient way of crossing New Guinea, and when it was found that the Utakwa led apparently to the highest mountain in the island, it was decided to withdraw the expedition, and to concentrate all the exploring energies on the Island River, which seemed to offer a better prospect of accomplishing that purpose.

When all these people had been taken on board the Valk, the decks of the little ship were crowded to overflowing with gear and men and wild animals. They had brought some young wild pigs, a number of crowned and other kinds of pigeons, and several young cassowaries. Mr. Dumas brought on board three eggs, from which were hatched pretty little cassowary chicks during the next few days. We were particularly struck by the appearance of the Dayaks, any one of whom looked more than a match for three of our Malay coolies. Apart from their apparent strength, they differed noticeably from the Malays, who like to spend their days in sleeping between meals, in their unceasing industry; they had brought on board quantities of bamboo, from which they at once started making bird cages, and pieces of hard wood, out of which they carved handles for their knives and other ornamental objects.

The ship was so heavily laden that it was impossible to take on board all the boats that had been used by the Utakwa expedition, and three or four were towed in a long string astern. Fortunately the sea was exceptionally smooth, but even so one of these, an almost new “long-boat,” broke adrift, and we lost a day in searching for it unsuccessfully.

CONVICT LUNATIC

Whilst we were cruising about looking for the lost boat, one of our passengers, a fever-stricken soldier from the Mimika, caused some excitement by stabbing with his knife another man and then jumping hastily into the sea. The sudden plunge cooled his fever and the appearance of a sea-snake swimming not far from him made him as anxious to return to the ship as he had been to leave it.

During the voyage down the coast we saw a number of sea-snakes, sometimes as far as thirty or forty miles from land, but there was no opportunity of catching one; they appeared to be yellowish with dark markings and were about three or four feet in length. I was told that they sometimes travel in large numbers together and will climb up the sides of ships at anchor, but I cannot vouch for the correctness of this statement.

Another episode, which enlivened the voyage down to Merauke, was caused by the strange behaviour of one of the convicts, who was being taken away from the Mimika. This man had suffered from the common form of delusion that everybody was against him, and after he had run away from the camp at Wakatimi and had spent thirty-six hours in the jungle without food I certified that he was of unsound mind and recommended that he should be sent back to Java. He was found prowling about the ship with an exceedingly sharp knife, with which (so he said) he intended to murder me, so he was promptly secured in chains. We made friends in a day or two and he was set at liberty again before we reached Merauke, but I confess I was not sorry when we were no longer together in the same ship.