CHAPTER XC.
NEW GUINEA.
THE HOME OF THE PAPUAN RACE — DISTINGUISHING MARKS OF THE RACE — DERIVATION OF THE NAME — GENERAL CHARACTER OF THE PAPUANS — THE SIGN OF PEACE — AN UNFORTUNATE MISUNDERSTANDING — DRESS AND ORNAMENTS OF THE TRIBES OF DOURGA STRAIT — THEIR AGILITY AMONG THE TREES — THE OUTANATA TRIBES — TATTOOING AND ORNAMENTS — ELABORATE ARCHITECTURE — WEAPONS — THE DUST SIGNALS AND THEIR MEANING — THEIR UNSUSPICIOUS NATURE — ABRAUW, THE CHIEF.
We now come to the very home and centre of the Papuan race.
New Guinea is a very large island, fourteen hundred miles in length, and, as far as has been ascertained, containing some two hundred thousand geographical square miles. It is separated from Australia only by Torres Strait, and, as we have seen, a certain amount of intercourse has taken place between the Papuans of the south of New Guinea and the natives who inhabit the north of Australia. Fertile in the vegetable kingdom, it possesses one or two animals which have the greatest interest for the naturalist, such as the tree-kangaroo, the crowned pigeon, and the bird of paradise. It is equally interesting to the ethnologist as being the home of the Papuan race.
Taken as a race, they are very fine examples of savage humanity, tall, well-shaped, and powerful. They are remarkable for two physical peculiarities. The one is a roughness of the skin, and the other is the growth of the hair. The reader may remember that some of the tribes of Southern Africa have the hair of the head growing in regular tufts or patches, each about the size of a pea.
It is a remarkable fact that, in the Papuan race, the hair grows in similar patches, but, instead of being short like that of the South African, it grows to a considerable length, sometimes measuring eighteen inches from root to tip. The Papuans are very proud of this natural ornament, and therefore will seldom cut it off; but as, if left untrained, it would fall over the eyes, they have various modes of dressing it, but in most cases manage to make it stand out at right angles from the head. Sometimes they take the hair of each patch separately and screw it up into a ringlet. Sometimes they tease out all the hairs with a wooden comb of four or five prongs, and, as the hair is very coarse and stiff, it is soon induced to assume a mop-like shape, and to increase the apparent size of the head to an enormous extent.
Indeed, the word Papua is derived from this peculiarity of the hair. In the Malay language, the word which signifies “crisped” is pua-pua, which is easily contracted into pa-pua. Even the hair of the face grows in similar patches, and so does that on the breast of the man, and in the latter case the tufts are much further apart than on the head or face.
The color of the Papuans is a very dark chocolate, sometimes inclining to black, but having nothing in common with the deep shining black of the negro. Their features are large and tolerably well made, though the nose is very broad at the wings, and the lips wide. The nose, however, is not flat like that of the negro, but is prominent, rather arched, and descends so low that when seen in front the tip nearly reaches the upper lip. The natives seem to be perfectly aware of this peculiarity, and perpetuate it in their carvings.
Although taken as a whole, they are a fine race, there are many diversities among the different tribes, and they may be divided into the large and small tribes. The former are powerfully built, but more remarkable for strength than symmetry—broad-breasted and deep-chested, but with legs not equal in strength to the upper parts of the body.
Their character has been variously given, some travellers describing them as gentle and hospitable, while others decry them as fierce and treacherous. Suspicious of strangers they certainly are, and with good reason, having suffered much from the ships that visited their coasts. A misunderstanding may soon arise between savage and civilized people, especially when neither understands the language of the other. An example of such a misunderstanding is given by Mr. Earle in his valuable work on the native races of the Indian Archipelago. Lieutenant Modera, an officer in the Dutch navy, embarked with several other gentlemen in the ship’s boat, for the purpose of landing on the shore of Dourga Strait, a passage between the mainland and Frederick Henry Island.
“When the boat had proceeded to within a musket-shot distance from them, the natives, who were armed with bows, arrows, and lances, commenced making singular gestures with their arms and legs. The native interpreter called out to them in a language partly composed of Ceramese, and partly of a dialect spoken by a Papuan tribe dwelling a little further to the north; but his words were evidently quite unintelligible to them, as they only answered with loud and wild yells. We endeavored, for a long time without success, to induce them to lay aside their weapons, but at length one of them was prevailed upon to do so, and the others followed his example, on which we also laid down our arms, keeping them, however, at hand.
“We now slowly approached each other, and the interpreter, dipping his hand into the sea, sprinkled some of the water over the crown of his head as a sign of peaceful intentions. This custom seems to be general among all the Papuan tribes, and in most cases their peaceful intentions may be depended upon after having entered into this silent compact.
“This they seemed to understand, for two of them immediately did the same, on which the interpreter jumped into the shallow water, and approached them with some looking-glasses and strings of beads, which were received with loud laughter and yells. They now began dancing in the water, making the interpreter join, and the party was soon increased by other natives from the woods, who were attracted by the presents. Mr. Hagenholtz also jumped into the shallow water and joined in the dance, and they soon became so friendly as to come close round the boat; indeed some of them were even induced to get in.”
Meanwhile their confidence increased, and they began to barter with their visitors, exchanging their ornaments, and even their weapons, for beads, mirrors, and cloth. They were very inquisitive about the strange objects which they saw in the boat, and, although they handled everything freely, did not attempt to steal. One of them took up a loaded pistol, but laid it down at once when the owner said it was tapu, or forbidden. Unfortunately, a misunderstanding then took place, which destroyed all the amicable feeling which had been established.
“While all this was going on, they kept drawing the boat—unperceived, as they thought—toward the beach, which determined us to return, as our stock of presents was exhausted, and there seemed no probability of our inducing any of them to go on board with us. Shortly before this, Mr. Boers had ornamented a Papuan with a string of beads, who, on receiving it, joined two of his countrymen that were standing a little distance off with the arms that had been laid aside, but which they had been gradually getting together again—a proceeding we had observed, but, trusting in the mutual confidence that had been established, we did not much heed it.
“At the moment in which we were setting off the boat to return on board, this man fixed an arrow in his bow, and took aim at Mr. Boers, who was sitting in the fore part of the boat, on which the latter turned aside to take up his gun, but before he could do so he received the arrow in his left thigh, which knocked him over, shouting, ‘Fire! fire! I am hit!’ as he fell. The order was scarcely given before every one had hold of his arms (which, as before stated, were kept at hand), and a general discharge put the natives to flight, swimming and diving like ducks.
“Before they took to flight, however, they discharged several more arrows at our people, one of which struck Mr. Hagenholtz in the right knee, another hit a sailor in the leg, while a third pierced a sailor’s hat and remained sticking in it; and lastly, a Javanese had the handkerchief shot off his head, but without receiving any personal injury.”
Three of the natives were severely wounded, if not killed, in this unfortunate affair, which evidently arose, as Mr. Earle points out, from misunderstanding, and not from deliberate treachery. Seeing the boats being pulled toward the ships while four of their companions were on board, they probably thought that they were being carried off as captives, as has so often been done along their coast by the slavers. They could not be expected to understand the difference between one white man and another, and evidently mistook the Dutch sailors for slavers, who had come for the purpose of inveigling them into the ships, where they could not be rescued.
The tribes of this part of the coast are not agreeable specimens of the Papuan race. They are barely of the middle size, and lightly built. Their skin is decidedly black, and they ornament their bodies with red ochre, paying especial attention to their faces, which are made as scarlet as ochre can make them. The hair is deep black, and is worn in various ways. Most of the men plait it in a number of tresses, which fall nearly on the shoulders, while others confine it all into two tails, and several were seen with a curious headdress of rushes, the ends of which were firmly plaited among the hair. They are a dirty set of people, and are subject to diseases of the skin, which give them a very repulsive appearance.
Dress is not used by the men, who, however, wear plenty of ornaments. They mostly have a belt made of plaited leaves or rushes, about five inches wide, and so long that, when tied together behind, the ends hang down for a foot or so. Some of them adorn this belt with a large white shell, placed exactly in the middle. Earrings of plaited rattan, necklaces, and bracelets, were worn by nearly all. Some of them had a very ingenious armlet, several inches in width. It was made of plaited rattan, and fitted so tightly to the limb that, when a native wished to take it off for sale, he was obliged to smear his arm with mud, and have the ornament drawn off by another person.
Their principal weapons are bows, arrows, and spears, the latter being sometimes tipped with the long and sharp claw of the tree-kangaroo.
The agility of these Papuans is really astonishing. Along the water’s edge there run wide belts of mangroves, which extend for many miles in length with scarcely a break in them. The ground is a thick, deep, and soft mud, from which the mangrove-roots spring in such numbers that no one could pass through them even at low water without the constant use of an axe, while at high water all passage is utterly impossible.
As the natives, who are essentially maritime in their mode of life, have to cross this belt several times daily in passing from their canoes to their houses, and vice versa, they prefer doing so by means of the upper branches, among which they run and leap, by constant practice from childhood, as easily as monkeys. (See p. 909.) There is really nothing extraordinary in this mode of progress, which can be learned by Europeans in a short time, although they never can hope to attain the graceful ease with which the naked savages pass among the boughs. In some places the mangroves grow so closely together that to traverse them is a matter of perfect ease, and Mr. Earle remarks that he once saw a file of marines, with shouldered arms, making their way thus over a mangrove swamp.
The familiarity of these people with the trees causes them to look upon a tree as a natural fortress, and as soon as explorers succeeded in reaching the villages, the natives invariably made off, and climbed into the trees that surrounded the villages.
Wild and savage as they are, the Papuans of Dourga Strait display some acquaintance with the luxuries of civilized life and are inordinately fond of tobacco, the one luxury that is common to the highest and lowest races of mankind.
Some travellers have stated that these Papuans are cannibals, and it is certain that their gestures often favor such an opinion.
The Papuans of Dourga Strait are admirable canoe men, and paddle with singular skill and power. They always stand while paddling, a plan whereby they obtain a great increase of power, though perhaps at the expense of muscular exertion. They give as their chief reason for preferring the erect position, that it enables them to detect turtle better than if they were sitting, and to watch them as they dive under water after being wounded.
Skirting the coast of New Guinea and proceeding northward from Dourga Strait, we come to the Outanata River, at the embouchure of which is a tribe that differs much from those natives which have already been described. They are a finer and taller set of men than those of Dourga Strait, and seem to have preserved many of their customs intact since the time when Captain Cook visited them. Their skin is a very dark brown, and is described as having a bluish tinge, and they are said to rub themselves with some aromatic substance which causes them to diffuse an agreeable odor.
It is probable that the bluish gloss may be due to the same aromatic substance with which the body is perfumed. Mr. Earle thinks that the odoriferous material in question is the bark of the tree called the “rosamala.”
The blue tinge is never seen among Papuan slaves, and this circumstance adds force to Mr. Earle’s conjecture.
The features are rather large, especially the mouth, and the lips are thick. The custom of filing the teeth to a sharp point prevails among this tribe, but is not universal. The eyes are small, and the septum of the nose is always pierced so as to carry a piece of white bone, a boar’s tusk, or some similar ornament. The hair is thick, and, instead of being trained into long tails like that of the Dourga Strait natives, it is plaited from the forehead to the crown.
The men wear scarcely any real dress, many of them being entirely naked, and none of them wearing more than a small piece of bark or a strip of coarse cloth made either of cocoa-nut fibre or of split bamboo. They are, however, exceedingly fond of ornament, and have all the savage love of tattooing, or rather scarifying, the body, which is done in a way that reminds the observer of the same process among the Australians. The scarifications project above the skin to the thickness of a finger, and the natives say that this effect is produced by first cutting deeply into the flesh, and then applying heat to the wounds. Anklets, bracelets, and other articles of savage finery are common, and a man who does not wear an inch of clothing will pride himself on his boar’s teeth necklace, his bracelets of woven rattan, and his peaked rush cap.
The women always wear some amount of clothing, however small, the very fact of possessing apparel of any kind being conventionally accepted as constituting raiment. Their solitary garment consists of a small apron, about six inches square, made from the cocoa-nut fibre.
It is rather remarkable that these people have the same habit of placing their new-born children in hot sand, as has already been described when treating of the now extinct Tasmanians. When the mother goes about her work, she carries the child by means of a sort of sling made of leaves or the bark of a tree.
The architecture of the Outanatas is far superior to that of their brethren of Dourga Strait. One of these houses, described by Lieutenant Modera, was at least a hundred feet in length, though it was only five feet high and six wide, so that a man could not stand upright in it. There were nineteen doors to this curious building, which was at first mistaken for a row of separate huts. The floor is covered with white sand, and the inhabitants generally seat themselves on mats. Each of these doors seemed to be appropriated to a single family, and near the doors were placed the different fireplaces. Over the roof a fishing net had been spread to dry in the sun, while a number of weapons were hung under the roof.
This house was built in a few days by the women and girls, and was placed near a much larger building, which had been raised on piles.
The weapons of the Outanatas are spears, clubs, and the usual bow and arrows, which form the staple of Polynesian arms.
The bows are about five feet in length, and are furnished with a string sometimes made of bamboo and sometimes of rattan. The arrows are about four feet in length, and made of cane or reed, to the end of which is attached a piece of hard wood, generally that of the betel-tree. The tips are mostly simple, the wood being scraped to a sharp point and hardened in the fire, but the more ambitious weapons are armed with barbs, and furnished with a point made of bone. The teeth of the sawfish are often employed for this purpose, and a few of the arrows are tipped with the kangaroo claw, as already mentioned in the description of the Dourga Strait spear.
Beside these weapons, the natives carry a sort of axe made of stone lashed to a wooden handle, but this ought rather to be considered as a tool than a weapon, although it can be used in the latter capacity. With this simple instrument the Outanatas cut down the trees, shape them into canoes, and perform the various pieces of carpentering that are required in architecture.
The most remarkable part of an Outanata’s equipment is an instrument which greatly perplexed the earlier voyagers, and led them to believe that these natives were acquainted with fire-arms. Captain Cook, who visited New Guinea in 1770, mentions that as soon as he reached the shore and had left his boat, three natives, or “Indians,” as he calls them, rushed out of the wood, and that one of them threw out of his hand something which “flew on one side of him and burnt exactly like powder, but made no report.” The two others hurled their spears at the travellers, who were in self-defence obliged to use their fire-arms.
Not wishing to come to an engagement, they retired to the boat, and reached it just in time, the natives appearing in considerable force. “As soon as we were aboard, we rowed abreast of them, and their number then appeared to be between sixty and a hundred. We took a view of them at our leisure. They made much the same appearance as the New Hollanders, being nearly of the same stature, and having their hair short-cropped. Like them they also were all stark naked, but we thought the color of their skin was not quite so dark; this, however, might be merely the effect of their being not quite so dirty.
“All this time they were shouting defiance, and letting off their fires by four or five at a time. What those fires were, or for what purpose intended, we could not imagine. Those who discharged them had in their hands a short piece of stick—possibly a hollow cane—which they swung sideways from them, and we immediately saw fire and smoke, exactly resembling those of a musket, and of no longer duration. This wonderful phenomenon was observed from the ship, and the deception was so great that the people on board thought they had firearms; and in the boat, if we had not been so near that we must have heard the report, we should have thought they had been firing volleys.”
The reader will doubtless remark here that the travellers were so accustomed to associate fire with smoke that they believed themselves to have seen flashes of fire as well as wreaths of smoke issue from the strange weapon. Many years afterward, Lieutenant Modera contrived to see and handle some of these implements, and found that they were simply hollow bamboos, filled with a mixture of sand and wood-ashes, which could be flung like smoke-wreaths from the tubes. The Outanatas, their weapons, canoes and the remarkable instrument just described, are illustrated on the following page.
Some persons have thought that the natives used these tubes in imitation of firearms, but the interpreters gave it as their opinion that they were employed as signals, the direction of the dust cloud being indicative of the intention of the thrower. Others say that the tubes are really weapons, made for the purpose of blinding their adversaries by flinging sand in their eyes. I cannot agree with this last suggestion, because the other weapons of the Outanatas show that the natives do not fight hand to hand like the New Zealanders. I think that the interpreters were right in their statement that the tubes are used for signalling, and this supposition is strengthened by the fact that the natives of Australia do use smoke for the same purpose, as has already been described.
The canoes of the Outanatas are often of considerable size, measuring fifty or sixty feet, and, although narrow in proportion to their length from stem to stern, containing a great number of men. They are handsomely carved and adorned with paint, and both ends are flat and broad. The rowers stand up when they use their paddles, which are necessarily of considerable length, having long handles and oval blades slightly hollowed. The narrowness of these canoes strengthens the opinion of several travellers, that the Outanatas are really an inland tribe, descending the river in flotillas, and returning to their inland home when the object of their expedition is accomplished.
They seem to be less suspicious than their countrymen of Dourga Strait, and have no hesitation in meeting Europeans and exchanging their own manufactures for cloth, knives, and glass bottles, the last mentioned objects being always favorite articles of barter with Polynesian savages, who employ them when entire for holding liquids, and, if they should unfortunately be broken, use the fragments for knives, lancets, points of weapons, and similar purposes. Lieutenant Modera describes the appearance of one of their flotillas as representing a perfect fair, the boats being laid closely together, and their decks crowded with natives laden with articles for barter.
Unlike the Dourga Strait natives, those of the Outanata River had no objection to come on board the European ships, and visited the vessels in great numbers. Even their principal chief came on board frequently. On the first occasion he disguised his rank, and merely came as an ordinary native, but he afterward avowed himself, and came freely on board in his own character. For convenience’ sake he called himself Abrauw, i. e. Abraham, a name by which he was well known for a considerable distance. He offered no objection to going below and entering the Captain’s cabin, though his subjects were rather uneasy at his absence, and shouted his name so perseveringly that he was obliged every now and then to put his head out of the cabin window. He had all the regal power of concealing astonishment, and witnessed with utter imperturbability the discharge of firearms, the ticking of watches, and examples of similar marvels. He did, however, display a little interest in the musketry practice, which was directed at a succession of bottles, slung from the yard-arm, but whether he was struck with the accuracy of aim or with the needless destruction of valuable bottles is doubtful.
He seemed to be worthy of his position as chief, and was desirous of establishing an European settlement near the mouth of the Outanata. Unfortunately, the river, although a noble stream, has a sandbar across the mouth which effectually prevents vessels of even light draught from passing except at high water. The people in general were wonderfully honest, not displaying the thievish propensities which cause the visits of many savage tribes to be so troublesome. They even brought on board articles which had been accidentally left on shore. They probably owe much of their superiority to their connection with the Malay Mohammedans, many of whom visit New Guinea as traders.
(1.) A SCENE IN THE NICOBAR ISLANDS.
(See page 897.)
(2.) THE OUTANATAS AND THEIR WEAPONS.
(See page 902.)