CURIOSITIES FROM THE ISLANDS.

Press, Volume XXXI, Issue 4264, 29 March 1879, Page 3

CURIOSITIES FROM THE ISLANDS.

["Sydney Morning Herald."] ■fffobably no _ider_k_g has a greater jj_i_B to adventurous minds than •* To wander far way, - Ob from island unto island at the gateway* --- >-«f the day." ■' - .. , *_f we who stay at home can feel a tmge or tfcTsxe&e-je-t as we listen to tal*t of New _(___» Explorations, or look upon the strange Tfect, brought by traveller* from the «__«<_ of the sea," If we are not the rose /_*_« Perrd-n proverb has it), we are then L_- the row, and ths condition is one which f££ ta s thrill of satisfaction. The South I__ wanderer who h-s latest returned to Sydney»» Kr Granville A. Wood, who for .Sgjjst twenty months ha. been cruising with eoscle of partners (white men, of cou-se), „-J three Kansk—, around the coast, of New Quia**, New Britain, and New Ireland. They traded for tortoiseshell, with an c^casionsl _jt__e"—e into pearl shell, and during his _say months wandering* i£r Wood made a <r __—id collection of native dresses, weapons, i£jj*, shells, and curiosities generally, which _m ti present in Sydney, and which be fljtec— to send to England. _be collection U extraordinarily rich in . WS opo_, articles which the native* of all Ibe island* visited seem to poesee* in. numbers, and 4r_eh generally play a prominent part in t jpCT interviiws with strangers. The clubs •from the New Guinea coast though heavy, «sd made with that laborious finish that could o_y be imparted to them by savages with pie—y of idle time on their hands, aro not in *ay wsy rem-rkaWe. From New Ireland come some remarkably neat articles, made of a dark wood like ebony, to which the owner* hare imparted a high polish. But the king of etch, hails from New Britain, where they _ie a piece of heavy dark green mottled granite and spend eight months or more in ___tng it to the form of a goose egg. and by th* use of hot stones and water, drilling a hole through it. Then a handle of dark wood, with a-knob at the end, is passed through a hole _ the stone, and the latter is steered against the top knob with gum, inlaid with white cowrie money, the result heing a club fit for a chief ia beauty, and of most «nv_cing strength. A grim joke is perpetrated in some " dummy tomahawks from New Britain and New Ireland. Made Oif light wood, ground to an edge, exact in shape, with the blade colored dark, like rusty iron, and the edge left light in hue, they rose—bis iron hatchets so closely that it is only when yon: lift one that you discover the deception. Some of them represent tomahawks «rf a shape that went out of use 100 years tgo, and the savages must have got their aodel before that. Chinese-like, they have imitated everything, even to trade marks, which they no doubt thought charmed symbols. Two'handed clubs, tough and ponderous, tcU of s race of strongarmed men, and ore is a large copy of an English arrow. The barbed head and the feathered shaft are shown, and this is curious enough when one is informed that the arrow. _s natives themselves use, are tapered to a head and bear no feather. These clubs were taken during Mr Brown's chastisement of tome murderers. Then we come to some rery " swell" affairs indeed, in the shape of a group of the spears used by chief* at feasts or other festive and religious gathering*. Their shaft* are mottled and carved with zig-zsg and croM-p-tterns so common, and pointed with a human thigh-bone or arm-bone, which looks a* much out of place amid the crimson sad yellow plume* that dance round it as ever the mummy did at an Egyptian feast Probably the owner was never so gaily decked or "poh-hed" during life as his leg or arm became after death, and he cwrt&_Ty never attncted so much attention. Some dress club*, of light make, are carried with the spear* at the " _efli._elli" dance, held quarterly. This, by the way, is not the dance the Mansfield outlaws are teaching tbe police. By all teeo-B— it is not nearly so difficult. A very complete collection of native stone tomahawk* la* been made, varying in size from the little thine two inches long to a circular affair about t*o feet round. Tbe square ones, made of a _ry stone or of a substance like green stone, are fixed in one prong of a wooden knee. They si» placed teansversely in a split, and bound with gum and bark ligature*. The circular one h_ a handle run through the central hole. Loo—Gg at them, and considering the bird-like packs that alone can be made with them, one —sains bow on earth the owners ever < __ged to cowtruct their weapons and build '. *___• eaaoes by their aid. In New Ireland , ths tps-r* of the common men are never emb___4 with human bones, that style of ' or___*a*aon being strictly reserved for the ; chiefs. from New Britain come a couple of —«_ «_t poisoned tips, whioh were ob__j—fromthe natives on the west coast, a rsjaaa whose geography i* at present in a _ry —its, on account of tho numerous reef* ¥__ impede exploration. The region is __d " Nucksneye " by its inhabitants, and oa ca_g here Mr Wood saw that the island -P-_hed_ at the middle like an hour-glass or the figure 8. The Solomon —lands contribute bows of pslwood and arrow* with •___ poisoned tip*, ingeniously fixed on with gum. When any poor wretch is pierced by one of these arrows, the heat of l_ flesh softens the gum, and when he tears oat the arrow the point remains inside. Then there are slings from all the islands, and these do not differ s bit from that which painters represent David ss using in his victory over Golisth. Among the weapons, too, may be be classed a mouth-bit of plaited grass with feathered ends. The warriors, champing this like a horse, work themselves into that state of bli&d mad fury that onr Norse progenitors knew as tbe Berrerk fit, and then rush into the fight determined to kill or be slain.

Perhaps dress should be described before weapons, but in Melanesia dress is so slight and -rms are so important, that the latter are entitled to pride of place. From the mainland of New Guinea come some feather headdresses, formed from the glossy dark plumage > ©f tks casso wiu-y (marook), or the glittering amber tail feather* of the bird of paradise. There are coronets to be bound round tbe head, and other head-dresses formed of feathers tied to a sharp spike, which is stuck mto the mop of frizzy wool which surrounds tha Papuan cranium. Dress itself troubles the Melanetian* very little, but as in civilised —ads the ladies wear more than the men. Unlike her civilised titters, however, a fair Papuan knows little of fashion's caprices, and can promenade in what belonged to her great grandmother, without a fear of being ovtre, or of teeing tbe snub notes of her sister savages made snobber by a sneer of contempt for her old-fashioned attire. The largest drew worn is ike "Eeedi,"a thick kilt of stained fibre woven in a band at the waist. These fibre* are sometime* stained brown and yellow, and if a few cress bare were added would look like a ahabby Highland kilt. From the North Foreland of New Guinea cornea a " reedi" of the split leaves of a tree of the breadfruit tribe. This is stained yellow, and at the waist i* finished off with scarlet wool, and tassel* decked with bright blue btada, evidently obtained from a trader. Every l_f hss been soaked and then crimped *i—a shell, and the whole dress must have **_-a four months to make. How the owner —__ to part with such a piece of finery is a Bystsay. In *ome place* the dress dwindles down to an inrignificant strip dependant from th* vc—tn's waist, and vanishes altogether in the «se of the men, while here and there tidies are worn constructed of coeoanufc fibre P*»~ed over with stained leaf fibre. Mats *od cloaks are enough. The South SsaJ'tappa," made of the bark of the paper ■wherry macerated and beaten, is known. Of at triangular cloaks are made, and deco- ?**•* **■__ patterns like the markings on the »*ck of a snake, several colors being used. *h«te are pierced with arm holes, and s«e_ to» worn only on a_to or festive occasions, rasping mats are made of woven fibre, and «w that Mr Wood has is made in aueh a ~®fb strong pattern that it ia practically -*wn-*tiisg. Moresby Island is represented $J a spktdid sash a couple of yard* long and ; Caches wide, woven in a cross pattern, and ; *«_h neat color* that „ looks like the pronaetof an European loom. Blanchard Island ! i 0-___eats and fishing implements are aaa ««— On them—-rage ingenuity, limited * aoo §b. faaa expended itself. No race of men *" aa to be so degraded as to possess no love « or___ent, if it be only to daub the akin *~?»lored earth. The Pspuan*, and tbe ?£_*• °* the islands near New Guinea are **her high in the social scale, so far as the **•« or-iaicent ia concerned. They grind 2_? chun ahtlis until a round flat *£*• is formed, and this suspended by a „r*gtksga milky- white against their dark _?"*•- --fctts white shells, and the teeth of tof_ B * a eo£ and "euacuaa," orcposaum, *2*B— led into amulets, necklace*, earrings, rings. Armlets are also made of J3"__* ground shell of the crab and of mS* I ***-, snd the natives contrive to wear * s ~« around tjja biceps muscle on _* opfper

pert of the arm, a spot where no European •oald .keep a tight ligature.- When decked for the dance they assume their feather head dresses, their mate, and carry on their becks mages of fish and alligator* carved in light wood and carefully printed. The colours known to them are the positive one*—red, yellow, and bine—and the secondary ones, green and pink._ The they get from a root, and the pink from the coral lime mixed with betel. Their fishing implements are very ingenious, and in the main features differ little from what Europeans use. The lines and cordage they twist wemld not disgrace any rope-walk in Australia, aad the net* they make are beautifully strong and even. Their want of iron is painfully manifest in their hooks, which are ground from shells. Here, however, their intellect;, sharpened by a struggle for food, ba* taught them to add to the hook a tail of shining fibre, and to give the body of the hook a screw, so that when dragged through tho water it present* exactly the appearance of a. little gßttering fish, and forms a fatal and effective lure. Surgery is represented by a block of obsidian, from which they strike off Isrminie, or eoales, as our Pictiab forefather* got their arrow-head*. These scales, or flint*, have a keen serrated edge, and when the bushy locks of a Papuan become too thickly populated by little insects called by them " nannoot," he shaves to the skin with his sharp .tone. Whenever, too, he feel* pain he bleed* himself at the aching spot and rubs coral lime into the cuts, a combination of remedies that generally, one would imagine, replaces the original pain by another more acute. Even a stomach-ache is so treated.

Religion, or rather superstition, forms a prominent feature in the islander's nature, and his whole life seems to be passed in a state of anxiety lest by transgression of some form or ceremony be should merit death. Supreme over everything to be feared eoems to be the " dook-dook," an institution by means of which tbe chiefs collect certain due* during the year. Mr Wood has got a "dook-dook," aad a curious affair it is; an object one might laugh at but for the knowledge that it has been the death of innumerable men and women. It consist* of a wicker frame like an extinguisher, which is covered with fibres, and which is worn by a chief's servant over his head and ■boulders. Tbe wearer is clothed from the armpits to the waist with leaves, and the "dook-dook" is crowned with the foliage of variegated plants. Merely this, and yet no Greek poet has ever imagined more unutterable stony horror at the right of Medusa's awful face wreathed with living snake-looks, t_-\ an islander, who has rot paid hi* dues, or any native woman, feel* at meeting the "dook-dook," or seeing it from afar. To either it is inevitable death, for if tbe "dookdook" sees them be promptly brains them with his club, and if he does'nt they imagine they are doomed and pine and die of very fear of death. Can it be wondered at then, that one day as Mr Wood's boat lay rocking under an overhanging cliff, two women ran (—.eking out upon the headland, and came hurtling down into the sea, because they heard that the Gorgon was approaching. They swam like otters into a rocky crevice, and lurked there until nightfall, and their fright so infected the white man's kanakas that for a j considerable time they could not be induced ! to rise from their posture, prone in the boat. Then there is the "Kin skinaoo," corresponding exactly to the "hand of glory" so eloquently described in the Ingoldaby legends. An ugly little combination of colored clay, feathers, and wood, yet holding thi* a savage can enter and plunder his neighbor's hut, knowingthat if his victim be asleep ho will remain so, aad that if awake he will not be able to resent the intrusion. The victim believes this as firmly as the thief, and so the charm maintains its credit, It will not surprise anyone to learn that the chisf* allow only a very few " kinakinaoos" to be made. The war girdle assumed by a husband whose wife has been stolen by a rival, gifts him with spirit assistance, and so paralyses his wronger with fear that the insult is generally atoned for by his life. Mr Wood has brought down some idols carved in chalk, carefully finished, and strangely enough with the hands in an attitude of prayer, an attitude that the -New Ireland native*, amongst whom the figures are found, know nothing about. It has been thought hitherto, that the chalk for these idols was thrown up by the *ea, but Mr Wood discovered a stratum of it in the interior of New Ireland. He has also brought numbers of skulls and the preserved skulls of chiefs. The latter aw prepared curiously enough. The front half only i* taken, and- the. lower jaw being bound in position, tbe mask ia plastered over with clay, until the flesh outlines are attained. The clay is then colored to resemble the chief when painted for the dance (not quite like a European belle though), and the whole is finished off with hair and whiskers of fibre. A "tobaran" or image of the devil, comes from New Britain. Music— instruments are represented by a rude affair of tortoiseshell like a jewsharp, and by by several long narrow drums. Cassowary eggs, canoe models, .hell money, baaketware, and a hundred other queer and sometimes "uncanny looking thing, form the re--mainder of Mr Wood's collection, one so complete that it is a pity it is not to be kept in Sydney for the public instruction.