At this time I had, under the supervision of a private of constabulary, gangs of several hundred Kaili Kaili at work, clearing gardens and carrying timber for the gaol and barracks; whilst another lot were searching for teakwood with me, and cutting it into piles for my house. Amongst my contingent was a short, squat, very powerful man of about forty years of age, who had at one time been badly wounded in the head, and at intervals broke into a frenzy of rage with no apparent reason; this individual was named Komburua. He had engaged to work two months with me for an axe, upon which he had set his heart, and which tool he was permitted to use at his work until it became his own. Komburua’s particular job was to cut the hewn piles to an exact length, as I measured and marked them. On one occasion, as I moved from one pile to another to measure it, Komburua seated himself upon the one I was stretching my tape along; I shifted him with a hard spank with my open hand, and again leant over my tape. Suddenly I caught sight, on the ground, of the shadow of an axe flying up above the shadow of my helmet; like lightning, I jumped to one side, just as that axe came crashing down on the very spot over which my head had been. Before Komburua had time to raise his axe again I had him pinned by the throat, whilst two police, who were but a few feet away, rushing up, first knocked him senseless with the butts of their rifles, and then, loading them, stood at my back, as I blew my whistle for the detachment to fall in—not knowing how much further the trouble was going. From all directions the men came tearing up, loading their rifles as they ran, and savagely striking out of their way any native in their path; while the excited natives gathered in clusters and jabbered, and spears appeared from nowhere. Poruta soon found out that Komburua’s attempt to split my skull was due to one of his sudden frenzies of rage, induced by my spank on his stern, and in no way concerned the other natives. He was given seven days in leg-irons, as a gentle hint to restrain his temper in the future, and we resumed our work.
VIEW FROM THE RESIDENCY, CAPE NELSON
Komburua afterwards tried to get square with me by poisoning our well at night, and, but for the accident of heavy rain falling at the time, thus washing away the greater portion of the poison, the whole lot of us would undoubtedly have been killed. As it was, we were all extremely ill; in fact, two men very nearly died, and I, for the life of me, could not make out what was the cause. The police said sorcery; I did not know what to think; I had no suspicion of the water, though I thought of poison; at the same time, I could not understand how it could have been administered to all of us. One alarming sign was that not a single native came near us. I took counsel with the police. “There is something very wrong,” I said, “but we have to find out what it is, before we can cure it.” “It is sorcery,” said the police. “Well, we must find out the sorcerer and deal with him; what sorcery can do, sorcery can undo,” I said. “The proper thing to do with a sorcerer is to hit him on the head with a club,” said Poruta, “for they are no good.” “All very fine,” I remarked, “but first catch the sorcerer.” “You have said it,” said Keke (Keke and the other Kiwais had stronger stomachs, and were not so bad as the rest of us); “these people know what they have done to us and are awaiting results; we can’t see them, but they are certain to have some one watching us. To-night, the strongest of us will sneak out and catch the watchers in the early dawn, and then we shall find out what is the trouble.” Keke’s plan seemed the best; that night, the five strongest men crept out, and, in the morning, they snapped up a solitary man, whom they discovered in a tree watching the camp, and brought him in. It was a man named Seradi, who later served for many years with me in the constabulary; in fact, he was still serving when I left New Guinea.
I showed Seradi our sick; as a matter of fact, with the exception of the five men by whom he had been caught, there was not one of us able to stand. I asked, “What is the matter with these men?” “I don’t know,” was the reply. “Why are all you people staying away from the Station?” “I don’t know,” he repeated, which was a palpable lie. “Reeve a rope, and hang him up,” I said. “What will the Governor say?” asked Keke; to which I replied, “It does not much matter what he says, for if we don’t find out what this trouble is, he’ll only have dead men to talk to.” The police rove a rope over a beam in the ceiling: I may say that, during our sickness, we were all living together in one big barrack room. “What are you going to do with me?” asked Seradi, as a noose was passed round his neck. “Hang you up by your neck until you are dead, then cut you open and look at your inside to find out why we are sick; you know, but won’t tell us while you are alive, and the rope round your throat will prevent the knowledge escaping when you are dead.” The rope tightened, Seradi choked and held up his hand. “Slack!” I said. “You want to talk?” I asked him. “Yes,” was his reply, “I don’t want to put you to all this trouble. Komburua poisoned your well; the people are staying away until you are all dead, when they will come and take all your wealth.” “Do the people want to fight us?” I asked. “Oh no,” he said, “but if you all die, they would like your things.” “Do you know where Komburua is?” I next asked. “Yes, alone in a bush house about half a mile away,” said Seradi. “Very good; if you take my police to him, and help them catch him, I will pay you two tomahawks and make you village constable of your tribe.” Seradi apparently thought that this was much better than being hanged, so went off with my five fairly sound men, and shortly afterwards returned with Komburua. In due time Seradi got his uniform as village constable, which position he filled with ability.
Komburua got six months’ hard labour, a sentence he received with extreme disfavour. His first job was to clean out the spring, and dig a channel in the rock, in which to lead the water to the gaol. “Komburua is to drink a pint of water from the well before breakfast every morning,” I told the police, “then, if there is any more foolery with our water, he will be the first man poisoned.” He afterwards became a very good worker indeed, and accompanied me as a carrier on many an inland expedition. He also became very friendly with me, in consequence of my curing a periodic headache he suffered from. One day, as he toiled with a crowbar at the rock of a precipice, up which we were cutting a new road, I noticed that his forehead was all scratched and cut, and asked him what was the matter. “There is a devil trying to break out of my head,” said Komburua. I sent him to sit in the shade of the gaol kitchen, and gave him some phenacitin tabloids, that eased his head a great deal quicker than his cutting and scratching had done. After he had served half his time, I made him prisoners’ cook to the gaol, a position of which he was very proud (though the prisoners at first regarded his appointment with eyes askance), and, at his earnest request, I let him off the pint of cold water before breakfast.
I remember Komburua, on one occasion, frightening fits out of the Chief Engineer of the Merrie England. I was going up the coast in that vessel, to cut a road from Buna Bay to the Yodda Gold-field. I had with me about a score of police and some couple of hundred Kaili Kaili: each Kaili Kaili had an axe, both as a weapon of defence and as a tool for work. My men—in addition to her own complement—crowded the vessel uncomfortably; but as my men slept about the decks and it was only for one night, it really did not matter. The night came, and with it heavy rain; my unfortunate Kaili Kaili crawled into alley ways, galley, cabins, in fact anywhere they could get, to be out of the wet. Officers and crew were perpetually falling over naked bodies in most unlikely places, and cursing Kaili Kaili and me alike—not that the Kaili Kaili cared. The Cape Nelson police and myself were the only persons they would listen to or obey; every one else was merely an objectionable foreigner. Komburua, in search of a dry spot, discovered the Chief Engineer’s cabin, that worthy being on watch; he then stretched his dirty greasy form upon the Engineer’s bunk and went to sleep. Presently the owner of the bunk came off watch, went to his cabin, and there discovered a huddled mass of wet cannibal on the floor and Komburua in his bunk; with curses and blows he shifted the men from the floor, hauled Komburua from his bunk, and hoofed him out of the cabin.
A few minutes later a steward, falling over the tangled heap of police and Kaili Kaili sleeping on the floor of my cabin, woke me up, wailing, “For God’s sake, sir, go to the Chief Engineer’s cabin; those blank savages of yours are killing him.” “Nonsense!” I said; but that wretched steward would not let me have any peace; so accordingly, cursing deeply all people who disturbed the sleep of the godly with vain alarms, I paddled along the wet deck to the Engineer’s cabin. There I found the Chief lying in his bunk, gazing absolutely horror-stricken at the bloodshot eyes of Komburua peering through the tangled mat of hair surmounting his hideous visage, while he thoughtfully felt the razor-like edge of his axe. At intervals the Chief yelped for help. “What the devil are you up to, Komburua?” I asked, as my naked foot took him fairly on the stern; “get out!” “He would not let me sleep in the dry, so I just gave him a fright,” said that worthy, as he retired, carefully sheltering his stern with his axe. “I thought the murderous brute was going to split my skull every second, and dared not move,” said the Chief Engineer; “it’s disgraceful that the Government should allow you to bring such savages on board. There’s some whisky in my locker; give me a drink.” “They are all right, and quite nice people if you are gentle with them; but if you use coarse sailor language and blows, you offend them,” I told him reproachfully; then I gave him a drink from his own bottle, and absent-mindedly carried the bottle away and shared it with the second engineer and the officer on watch.
About a week after I was first established at Cape Nelson, old Giwi came in, followed by a strange native who gambolled like a kitten when he caught sight of the police and myself, and exhibited extravagant joy in divers ways. He proved to be the sole survivor of ten Dobu carriers, who had bolted from the Mambare at the time of the massacre of Green and his men: the other nine had been caught and eaten at intervals along the coast by the Notu and Okein people. This man, weary and frightened, had reached Giwi’s village; there Giwi had protected him, and employed him as an unpaid labourer in his garden—practically a slave. He told me that he had had a dreadful time chasing the Merrie England from fiord to fiord, when last she came, but could never quite catch her; then one morning he had caught sight of the flag flying over my camp, and had persuaded Giwi to bring him to me for a reward. I bought him from Giwi for a tomahawk, and as he swore that he never meant to leave the shelter of the police camp again, I made him cook to the constabulary. About eight months later, however, as the Merrie England was going to his home, I seized the opportunity of sending him there.
I then found out that numbers of runaway carriers from the diggers of the Mambare were continually being caught and eaten by the tribes along the coast. The local natives had their own grievance against the runaways, for the latter used to steal their canoes and also sneak into their gardens and help themselves to food. North and south I then sent notices, offering a reward of a tomahawk each for all live runaway carriers brought to me, and threatening dire vengeance against any people killing them.