Some Experiences of a New Guinea Resident Magistrate

by C. A. W. Monckton

KAILI KAILI NATIVES

A hut had been constructed by the natives out of sago palms, for which the Governor had left payment on his last visit, and in it the police and I now took up our quarters. It was situated in a grass patch of about an acre, on a bluff overlooking the harbour: bush extended from the grass patch along the top of a shelving plateau of about thirty acres in extent. After the Merrie England had departed, I turned my attention to the defence of our post: we had three months’ stores, but a safe water supply was essential, and the Governor in selecting the site had quite overlooked this. At last we discovered a spring some few hundred yards away in the bush; so I accordingly had a four-hundred-gallon tank containing rice emptied, and then re-filled with water from the spring, in order that, should we be forced to fight, we should not be entirely without this necessary. Our first night at Cape Nelson was a very uncomfortable one: natives howled, blew horns and beat drums in the bush all round us the whole night long; whilst a large fleet of canoes assembled and hovered under the bluff on the seaward side, until we shifted them by dropping a few rifle shots into the water near them, and also shooting over them one of half a dozen rockets I had begged from the Commander of the Merrie England.

The following morning I decided to build a stockade round our hut, inside which no native was to be permitted to enter. Upon some hundreds of men appearing, we arranged with them—through Poruta, who spoke a language which a few of them understood—to bring us posts and timber for the stockade, telling them we wished to erect a fence to keep pigs in. We paid them for each piece of timber brought, in beads, or broken glass bottles, which they used for shaving: some men we kept and paid for digging a series of holes all round the camp. When all the timber was in, we got the natives to plant the posts of the stockade; and before they quite realized what was occurring, they had built for us a solid wall of about four feet high, which an hour’s toil on the part of the constabulary converted into a twelve-foot stockade. Then and only then, the police and I breathed freely and felt fairly secure: we now had a little fort, three months’ provisions, enough water to last a month, and we felt fairly confident that we could hold our new home against anything that might come against us.

The next day I thanked my stars for that stockade. The constabulary had purchased from the natives a supply of betel-nut and prepared lime, which they chewed; then, to my horror, I suddenly discovered that, with the exception of three men, the whole squad was stupid and drugged from the effects of some narcotic contained in the lime. The three men had been on guard, and had not used either the betel-nut or the lime. I thrashed the slumberers, but without effect; then I administered huge doses of castor oil and calomel, which in a few hours got in its work and restored them to their senses. A very frightened lot of men they were when they recovered, and discovered the helpless position they had placed us in.

Corporal Sara now came to me with a fresh alarm. “How many cartridges have we got, sir?” he asked. “About three thousand rounds,” I replied. “Have you looked at the boxes?” he queried next. “No,” was my answer, “they are ordinary service cartridges, I suppose.” “They are nothing of the sort,” said Sara; “with the exception of the rounds in the men’s pouches and one box of 320, they are all cartridges condemned by Captain Butterworth years ago. They burst the rifles when you attempt to fire them.” I examined the boxes, and found they were filled with a patent cartridge made by Eley Brothers, which was supposed to consume its own case when fired. I made certain experiments with these cartridges, by firmly securing rifles to trees and firing them with a string attached to the trigger, and found that they did one of three things on every occasion: either the explosive consumed the case entirely and generated gases which blew the breech block clean out of the rifle; or it did not completely consume the case and effectually blocked up the cartridge chamber with the remains; or it left the brass case of the cartridge and cap stuck firmly to the fire pin of the rifle. If I could have got hold of the Government Storekeeper then, I would have shot him, and cheerfully have hanged for doing it. Fifteen men left among some thousands of the supposed wildest savages in the world, and the larger portion of our ammunition more dangerous to the user than to an enemy!

“The fever medicine,” said Sara, “is as bad as the cartridges; the tablets go right through the men like stones.” I examined some of the quinine tablets, which were supposed to be made by some people called Heron, Squire and Francis. I took two, soaked them for a night in whisky, and they were as solid as shot after it; then I put another couple into dilute hydrochloric acid, and they resisted that. I believe the things were made of plaster-of-Paris or cement. Fortunately I had a couple of ounces of Howards’ Sulphate of Quinine, and half a dozen bottles of Burroughs and Wellcome’s Bisulphate of Quinine in tabloids, in my private stock, and could carry on with that. The iodoform supplied for wounds was just as bad: if you put it on a wound, the thing promptly festered, suppurated, and got angry-looking. Afterwards I took a bottle of the filth to Sydney, had it examined, and was told that it was composed of chalk and boracic acid, scented with iodoform and coloured with saffron. I don’t say Heron, Squire and Francis supplied it—there is a law of libel—but it was in bottles bearing their name.

THE “MERRIE ENGLAND” AT CAPE NELSON, AND GIWI’s CANOES

A few days after I had been established at Cape Nelson, we sighted a schooner, and I went off to her in my whaler to get the latest news and exercise my tongue gossiping in English. The schooner proved to be the Albert McLaren, bound for the Mambare, and carrying Bishop Stone-Wigg; he was frightfully ill with a most malignant attack of malarial fever, and was sweltering in a tiny cabin. “I cannot go on to the Mambare, R.M.,” said Bishop Stone-Wigg; “the schooner can go on with stores. Will you give me a tiny corner in your camp until she returns?” “My Lord,” I said, “I have got a tiny tent 10 by 12 feet, and that is joined to a house 20 by 12 holding fifteen police, all contained inside a fence enclosing an area of about half a tennis lawn; we live hard and at any time we may die hard; but if you like to share it, come by all means.” “Anywhere to lay my aching head,” said the Bishop. Accordingly I took him ashore. He stayed with me a fortnight, and we only had one slight breeze, when I made him drink a glass of spirits every night before he went to bed, on the top of a strong dose of quinine; he was as weak as a kitten and badly needed a stimulant.

At the end of the fortnight, the steamer President came, and the Bishop left in her for his head Station at Wedau: I accompanied him, as he very kindly offered me the services of his Mission carpenter to repair some damage done to my whaleboat, which had come about in this way. The site chosen for my present house was situated over a rocky little bay, open to the stormy south-easters, and really unsafe for a boat to lie in: the only secure place in which the boat could be left was half a mile away, where she was likely to be either stolen or destroyed by natives. To haul the boat up on the rocky beach was a task beyond the strength of the men on the Station; we therefore usually employed some of the local natives, who were engaged clearing the Station site for us, to help haul her up: these natives, however, were always ordered away from the Station to their villages at five o’clock in the afternoon. Some of the police had been sent in the whaler during the day to collect shells and coral for lime-making purposes, and returned after five; the result of which was that we had not men enough to haul up the boat, and accordingly I told them to anchor her out at the full length of the chains. Shortly after this was done, I noticed that when the tide went out the boat’s stern would be dangerously near the rocks, and sent a couple of police to shift her further out—which they apparently did. The following morning I discovered the whaler on the rocks with her stern smashed in; and then found that the two fools I had sent had shifted her further out by hauling in and shortening the chains, thereby allowing her to drag her anchors in the strong night wind and smash on the rocks. The damage done was about equal to twenty pounds: a benevolent Government held that when accidents of this sort occurred, they were due to carelessness, and the men or officer responsible should meet the expense out of their or his private money. “Here’s a pretty pickle,” I said; “if I stop the two men’s pay, they will get nothing for twelve months.” My own pay was already mortgaged for four months ahead, to pay debts incurred on my last leave: the Bishop’s offer, however, of his carpenter, helped me out of the difficulty, and all I had to pay was five pounds towage to the President. We plastered up the stern of the whaler to get her as far as that.