The headings of the last four chapters suggest one of the greatest difficulties that stand in the way of Mission work in Papua. That is the number of different languages spoken by the people. At Delena both the Motu and Maiva languages are used. The Nara villages have a language of their own. Hisiu is an offshoot from Maiva. At Morabi we are amongst the Motu people again. Korona has a different language, and that of Kabadi is distinct from either.

Fortunately in all the villages Motu speaking people can be found, as well as some who know a little English, but unity amongst a people who have no common language is not to be expected.

The Kabadi villages lie on the flat land between the hills, and the sea, in Redscar Bay, and are all some distance from the latter. With a guide they can be approached by way of Galley Reach, and the Apiisi River, but in fine weather the best way is by entering the Aroa River, which flows into Redscar Bay. The Samoan boat was ready for us, and the only incident of the journey was the seeing of a big crocodile on a mud bank near the spot where we made fast to the bank of the river to have breakfast.

Vanuabaka is at the end of a long creek leading out of the main river. The houses are scattered about under the tall cocoanuts, which, as you will see in the picture, appear to be trying to get out of the ground in which they are growing. This peculiar appearance is probably the result of the continual sweeping up of the village, and sometimes the people find it necessary to place wattle fences round the roots and fill in with the sweepings of the village. Here, unlike Nara, the houses are all separate, and neighbours are given rather a wide berth. Timoteo’s house stands near the centre of the village inside a neat fence. His wife, with true Samoan hospitality, has wreathed vines and flowers not only round the verandah posts, and along the front of the house, but even round the posts of the home-made bedstead and over the wall of the small room devoted to our use.

Magazines and papers are passed from one to another in Papua, but the final use of many of them is to provide wall-paper for teachers’ houses. Timoteo’s house is so lined and the effect, if peculiar, is also useful, for a picture gallery is provided. I might almost have written a library, for I have found my wife going round the room trying to connect up the various parts of a serial, and getting on a box to reach those nearer the roof. On one occasion, so mounted, she managed to take a crochet pattern from an odd leaf of a ladies’ paper.

Few teachers knew their people better, or entered more into their life, than did Timoteo. As a boy he came to Kabadi with his father, who was the first teacher there, and after returning to Samoa for training at Malua, he succeeded his father, who had died at his post. His case is an example of what it costs the South Sea men and women to engage in work for Christ in Papua. His mother, his father, and his stepmother all died in Kabadi. He and his three children all died there, and his widow returned to her home alone. She wished to remain and carry on the work, and when that was declared impossible expressed the hope that some day she might again be able to join us.

At the time of which I am writing both teacher and wife were at their best, and in the evening after the big gathering on the verandah for prayers, there was much to talk about. A little girl called Papauta, after the girls’ school in Samoa, was put forward for inspection. A jolly little smiling savage she looked, and never before in her short life, had she been so happy. When her mother died her father took no notice of her, and Fafoa, Timoteo’s wife, found her crawling about the village fighting with the pigs for scraps of food. For a time it was doubtful if she would recover from such neglect, but care won the day, and Papauta is now a strong, thickset girl who, when Fafoa left for Samoa, came to live with us at Delena. Her father tried to claim her, but the Government decided that as the Mission had saved her life, she should live at the Mission till old enough to start life on her own account.

A sad story of cruelty was introduced by reference to a small enclosure we had seen under a house opposite to the teacher’s. A man had died and his relatives instead of comforting and helping his widow, had destroyed all her plantations and so ill-treated her that she would have died but for the help of Fafoa. They prevented the poor woman, who was covered from head to foot with a mixture like lamp-black, from eating anything but scraps of food. She was ordered not to be seen in the village or any of the tracks round it, and no one must hear her voice. She was confined in the little enclosure we had noticed under the house, from cock-crow in the morning till the village was all quiet at night, and even then she was only allowed to go on to the verandah of her house. Her well-grown children were threatened that if they attempted to help their mother they would be killed.

Why all this trouble and persecution? Simply this: the woman’s husband had died and his relatives believed that some wrong-doing on her part had made the spirits angry, and caused them to kill him.

Fafoa feared neither the threats nor the spirits, and at night she fed the woman and kept her alive till I was able to get the cruelty ended. Kabadi natives as much as any in this dark country need to learn the Golden Rule. They certainly know nothing of it till they are taught.

The school the next morning was worth a visit. Timoteo was a success as a teacher, as at most other things, but not as a singing master. His classes were well ordered, and more advanced than any others in the district. Seventy-six children were present, and they began badly, for they chanted the opening hymn on one note only. That was the weakest point. The strongest was the adaptation of the kindergarten methods to the teaching of the alphabet. Suddenly, while we were engaged with the seniors, all the smaller children rushed out of school and through the open doors and windows we saw the boys climbing cocoanut palms. There was a scramble for the fronds they threw down, and soon the children returned to school each carrying a bundle of the mid-rib they had got from the fronds. These looked like lengths of fine spring wire. With much energy they got to work, and when it was their turn to stand in front of the table, each child had a handful of letters made from the mid-rib, from which he or she sorted out and held out the particular letter asked for. With such letters as D or P it was a simple matter, for when once fixed they remained in the shape desired. S. G. M. and others were more difficult to manage, for though the pieces of mid-ribs were ready they had to be fixed or bent into position when held up. The children enjoyed the work, using their strong teeth in the place of scissors or nippers, and when the lesson was over the table looked as though basket-makers had been at work.

Here again one noticed that the position of the scholar in the class determined not only the angle at which he looked at his book, but in some cases the angle at which he wrote or printed his capital letters. Some of them were on their backs, and others leaning to either right or left. One boy signed his slate with carefully printed capitals—I.K.O.B.O.U.—a full stop after each letter.

The Sabate was to be spent at Ukaukana, so that we might be in touch with three villages for the services of the day.

Two hours across a plain as flat as a table top, and through grass in many places above our heads, brought us to a large banana plantation. At the right season it would be a grand place for a Sunday school treat, if the owners did not object. To travellers it was acceptable because it gave the only bit of shade to be found in the two hours’ walk, and we lingered long enough to enjoy it and notice that the natives had marked off each man’s share of the plantation by rows of bright dracena and coleus. The rich vegetation told that we were not far from the river, and we were no sooner out of the plantation and through a small village, than there was the Aroa River at our feet but some twenty feet below us.

Cool and rapid it hurried down to the sea, but when in flood it mounts that twenty feet of bank in a single night and takes possession of the village and most of the surrounding flat land. To cross then is out of the question, and to do so now is a novel experience, but if you trust yourselves to the natives, and like good girls and boys, do as you are told, you will be landed safely on the other bank without a ducking.

A canoe, made by hollowing out a tree trunk and roughly shaping the outside, is waiting tied to the bank by a length of cane. Both ends are shaped alike, so it is difficult to say which is the stem and which the stern, but for the time being the end pointing up stream is the stem and there stands the ferryman. He finds no difficulty in keeping his balance, nor does the canoe rock while he is alone, but the moment one not to the manner born puts a foot in the canoe, it seems to become alive and possessed with the determination to get rid of the stranger by turning over and throwing him into the water.

There is no outrigger nor any contrivance to keep the craft steady, except willing hands (far from clean) ready to help you to embark. Before they let go it will be well if the canoe happens to be wide enough to sit right down inside, despite the mud and water. If that cannot be managed then put your walking stick across from gunwale to gunwale and sit as low as possible on that. No doubt the boys and girls who are watching from both banks think this a lot of preparation for what they do without a thought, and the chances are that when they notice the start caused by the first wobble of the canoe, they will have a good laugh, but to the novice it is no laughing matter. I can only compare the sensation to that feeling of utter helplessness experienced during the first attempt to ride a bicycle.

The signal is given to let go, and then the boy in the bows begins to punt the canoe up stream as close to the bank as he can keep, till he thinks he has gone far enough to enable him to reach the proper landing on the gravel spit on the other side. He then pushes out into the stream the force of which turns the head of the canoe down towards the sea. His punting pole will not now reach the bottom, and the canoe is at the mercy of the current. As soon as he can touch the bottom again with his pole his action retards the downward rush of the bows and the canoe is brought alongside the bank with her head up stream again.

Willing hands help the passengers ashore, and if you do not want moments of anxiety as to the baggage pass on to the teacher’s house at once, for if you stay to watch you will see some at least of the carriers standing where you found difficulty in sitting, and with the boxes still on the poles between them.

The old Naime, whose picture caused such consternation when shown on the sheet, has been succeeded in the chieftainship by his son, also Naime, but not half the man his father was, either in size or anything else.

Naime the First always went hunting when he heard I was in the neighbourhood, so that he might have some fresh wallaby to offer. Naime the Second has not energy enough for that, so confines his attention to seeing that his wife cooks a bowl of bananas, and then escorts her to the teacher’s verandah, and sits down to wait for the return present. Years ago when talking to old Naime, I asked him why he had not listened to our message, and why he had not joined the Church. He had always been on the best of terms with the teachers and often attended the services. His reply was a bit of good sound advice for a young missionary. He was still proud of his strength and his success as a hunter, and having duly dwelt upon these he said “but natugu (he always called me his child), my inside is old and hard. I cannot receive the new words. Look to my grandchildren. They are young, and you can teach them.” His son has seen to it that the old man’s wish has been carried out, and all his children have been regular attendants at school, and can read and write well.

Memories of Naime crowd one on another. When first I knew him he was a widower, and every time we met, his vigorous Papuan embrace used to transfer some of his lamp-black mourning to my clothes. Once we met at another village, and in great excitement for so dignified a man, he said—

“Natugu, I have a new wife.”

“Yes. That is good.”

“Donisi, do you hear? I have a new wife.”

“Yes, I hear. I have told you that is good.”

“Donisi, I have got the new wife, but I have not got a new Beritani dress for her.”

“All right, Naime. You have found the wife. I will find the dress for her.”

As soon as possible I sent along a dress made of bright red Turkey twill, and the next time I went to Ukaukana there was Naime waiting to receive me, and in the background the new wife (who turned out to be very old and a cripple) struggling to get into the dress. She could not manage it, so it fell to the lot of the Missionary not only to provide the dress, but to act as lady’s maid to the old woman, and show her how she was to get into it.

Hanging in front of Naime’s house was the under-jaw of a crocodile, which must have belonged to a big animal, for it was more than three feet long. One night Naime found this creature carrying off his pig, and running alongside he killed it with his stone club. On land he knew no fear, but could never be tempted to trust himself to the sea. Time after time he promised to visit me at Port Moresby, and once came as far as Morabi, but as soon as it was a question of getting into the boat, he pleaded that he was not well and had better return to his village.

Some of our teachers have to complain that the village people will not help them, but Luteru once got more than he wanted at Naime’s village. He was a grand gardener, and good teacher, but a poor house builder, and when he was ready to occupy his new house he found it was leaning on one side. Either it must be straightened up as it stood, or taken down and rebuilt. The second course was only to be thought of if the first failed, so Luteru called his people together and explained what was wanted. Work of that kind could not be undertaken without a feed and pig-killing. The day was appointed, and the pig duly killed and eaten, and then the ropes having been fixed, Ukaukana men showed what they could do. It was a bit more than was wanted and the last state of that house was worse than the first. A long pull, a strong pull, and a pull all together, instead of straightening the house up, pulled it too far, and down it came with a crash on the other side. Luteru had to rebuild, and in addition to suffering the loss of his pig, had to put up with unlimited chaff from his fellow-teachers.

The Sunday was a day of rest and quiet for the carriers but not for the Missionary, who had to visit three villages and hold services in each. We began with the village where we were staying, and had a good gathering at the early morning service. After breakfast Kopuana further up the river was visited, and the new church seen for the first time, and in the afternoon Keveona on the other bank of the river. Here the first baptism in the village took place in the new church, and the evening was occupied in talking to the people at Ukaukana.

Monday saw the same round for the purpose of examining the schools, and at each village the boys who accompanied us had a story to tell of the previous night’s experience. Few nights are ever undisturbed in any native village, for either the pigs, the dogs, or the children do their best to prevent rest, but it is not often a crocodile joins in the fray. That particular night we heard a disturbance under the house, and upon inquiring were informed that for safety the teacher penned his pig under the house at night. There was then no need to seek further for certain troubles which had made us think the house was not very clean. The disturbance was caused by a crocodile, evidently a true Papuan and fond of pork, coming up from the river and seeking his breakfast at the expense of the teacher. The pig being blessed with a big voice gave warning and the crocodile had to seek his breakfast elsewhere.

The crocodile has, however, taken our thoughts away from the schools we set out to examine. At one, big things were being attempted. The teachers had been asked to see that the children committed to memory certain passages from the New Testament, and one of them, when the ordinary school work had been gone through, said he was ready to show what his children could do in that way. It may be well to begin at the beginning in most things, but when I heard the first child begin to recite the first chapter of Matthew I thought the choice not the best possible. Six verses for each child they went through that chapter with all its hard names, which sounded stranger still in their native form. Chapters two, three, four, and part of five had been repeated with wonderfully little prompting before there was any weakness shown. The end of the fifth chapter could not be reached, and then the teacher explained, “That is all they can do at present.” He had hoped that they would be able to reach the end of the book in time, but was advised to discontinue the attempt to teach the whole book, and confine his attention to certain chapters and passages indicated. What had been accomplished showed that the native child had a retentive memory.

At the second school the teacher was making a strong point of English, and here again the surprise was kept till last. The two biggest boys in the school, one fast nearing the dandy age, and already smeared red and wearing feathers, stood up, and turning towards each other, but being careful not to look at each other, Number One literally growled out—

“Good-morning, my dear.”

“Good-morning, my dear,” replied Number Two in a tone which did not agree with the endearing words, but suggested, “I will settle this with you when I get you outside.”

“I hope you are well this morning,” was asked, and answered by, “I am quite well, thank you”; but the manner implied, “what has that got to do with you?”

“I hope your father is well this morning” gave the opportunity for an answer more to the mind of Number Two, for with evident satisfaction he said, “I have not seen my father this morning.”

When a native meets you his first question is either “Where have you been?” or “Where are you going?” so naturally the English lesson followed the same line.

“Where have you been?”

“I have been to Kanosia.”

“What did you go to Kanosia for?”

“I went to buy some kerosene.”

“What did you pay for the kerosene?”

“I paid some bananas.”

Each question was typically native. They cannot understand a walk for a walk’s sake. Amongst the first Government Officials to settle at Port Moresby was one who took a long walk every afternoon, and as there were few good tracks, went nearly always in one direction. So puzzled were the boys that one day they followed him, and upon their return, told with the greatest wonder that he went half way to Pari (a village eight miles from Port Moresby) and then turned back. “There was not even a bit of tobacco as the reason for the long walk.”

The native not only wants to know where you are going, or why you are going, but what you paid for anything you may have to get, so the teacher at Kopuana was only helping the boys and girls to express their desires in English instead of native speech.

A few couples went through the lesson without a stumble, and pronounced the words correctly, but others failed, and the whole incident was an illustration of the difficulty of one man teaching English when the children hear nothing but their own language around them.

At the third village the teacher is a Papuan who for ten years has tried hard to influence for good a people who do not want to be so influenced. They prefer their old ways though it was at their own request that a teacher was sent to live with them. At times they have not only been indifferent, but violent towards Aihi, and on one occasion would have probably killed him but for the help of his son who is one of the strongest young men in the neighbourhood. As it was he was nearly blind for some weeks owing to one of his assailants trying to gouge out his eyes. After this I offered to remove him to another village, but he declined, saying that in time the people would hear his message and learn what he had to teach.

Aihi’s house and compound are an object lesson, and should show his fellow-countrymen what one of their own people can do when he sets his mind on a changed life. Around his house are growing oranges and bread-fruit, both introduced by the missionary, and illustrating a side of the work not often thought of at home. The Papuan owes the bread-fruit to the children’s ship John Williams. Sections of the root were packed in earth by the missionaries in Samoa, and sent by her to us here. The Samoan teachers knew its value as a food supply and readily planted it round their houses. The Papuan teachers planted on the strength of our recommendation and are now reaping the reward, but the advantage does not stop there. The village people are begging for pieces of the root and planting for themselves, and so they are being helped in their food supply, often far from plentiful, by the assistance the British children give to the John Williams. On many voyages her captain might have added to old Captain Turpie’s description of her cargo as “Missionaries and Bibles” the words “and bread-fruit trees from Samoa to Papua.”

One more village remained to be visited and then the journey home. At Matapaila we were rather reminded of Nara, where Queen Koloka ruled. The Samoan teacher, though a stately old man, was evidently overshadowed by his wife, who not only told him what to do in the house, but how to manage school, and what he should preach about on the Sunday and Wednesday and Friday. He did not object, and between them they had a good school, though they made the mistake of wanting to keep the young people they had taught in regular attendance even after they were married. They did not like the numbers to go down and could not wait till the next generation had taken the places of those who had gone to the ordinary work of life.

The best picture of Matapaila could have been obtained at night when it was too dark to use the camera. The house had two rooms—a small bedroom and a large sitting-room. After the evening meal a boy took up a bell like that used by a railway porter (where it had come from I do not know) and rang it on the verandah till we had to cry for mercy. It was heard in the last house of the scattered village, and the children and young people came trooping in, and sat down round the wall. Many of them had New Testaments which they had bought for themselves, and the teacher had three to pass round to those who had none of their own. There were two lamps, the one on the small table at our side, and the other a hurricane lantern. All this preparation had been made for family prayers, and there was no doubt about the teacher and his wife being the father and mother of the village children. Of the hymn we had better say nothing, but the reading was first class. The room was not well lighted but we could tell who was reading by the position of the lantern as it was passed round to give light where it was needed. One of the elder boys offered prayer, and then all repeated the Lord’s Prayer.

After that some had reasons to give for their absence from school that day, and others for their desiring to be away the next day, and I did not once hear, “I had to stay at home to mind the baby.” Hunting, fishing, gardening and trading seemed to stand in the way of education, and the youngsters spoke of it all as though they were grown-up men and women, and could take their full share in it all.

Exactly how the conversation reached it I do not remember, but at last we were talking of English children and their games. There were not many we could indulge in in the house, but—I wonder if you will be shocked when I tell you; I cannot help it if you are—there was one they had never heard of, but the name of it took their fancy. Two short sticks were soon procured, and in a few minutes two boys were trussed up and put in the middle of the room ready for a “cock fight.” All looked very solemn till one of the party (guess who) gave his best imitation of a cock crow. Others soon tried and a merry and noisy party was the result. The climax was reached when one of the “cocks” rolled over and was unable to get up again. The noise attracted the elder people, who crowded on to the verandah and blocked the doors and windows, till we began to fear for the safety of the house. It was not guaranteed to carry more than the ordinary weight of the district, so the game had to end, and on the best of good terms the party broke up. The ball had been set rolling however, and next morning several laughing groups could be seen in different parts of the village repeating the performance of the previous night.

Without again visiting the river we made our way back to Vanuabaka. The village is nearly always short of water, and that night a little incident occurred illustrative of one of the discomforts of travel in parts of Papua. A bath at the end of the tramp was out of the question. Water could not be spared for that. In the middle of the night there was the welcome sound of rain upon the thatch, and soon it began to drop gently from the eaves. The temptation was great, and the village was all quiet and dark, so one in the house, taking soap and towel, slipped out and round to the back to enjoy a shower-bath. Alas! he had no control of the tap that supplied the water, and no sooner was the soaping stage completed than the shower was cut off. In vain he waited for it to be turned on again. At last he had to give up, and as you can easily imagine, the last state of that man was worse than the first, and continued so till he could get to the river the next day. The memory of clothes sticking to a lavishly soaped skin remains vivid.

At Hisiu we were back on the coast, and although we had only been away a week we were glad to feel again the fresh sea breeze. The shed-like house again became our quarters, and as school had not been examined during our first visit part of the next day was devoted to that and to cleaning up and bandaging a poor fellow who had been badly mauled by a wild pig. Bandages and dressings were left with the teacher and before long the man was able to go hunting again.

In the afternoon, as the falling tide offered firm instead of soft sand to walk upon, we left Hisiu, and had done several miles before the long shadows warned us that it was time to look out for a camping ground. It was found on a sand spit at the mouth of a river, and while one half of the party put up the tent, the other half cooked the supper. Prayers and a chat round the fire closed the day, and we felt much like children who hear a ghost story before going to bed, for one of the boys told how a relative of his had been carried off by a crocodile from the very spot on which we were camped. However, we suffered from nothing worse than our thoughts, and even the memory of what he had seen did not prevent the boy who had told us the story from stretching himself by the fire and sleeping soundly.

Breakfast with the glories of a tropical sunrise all around, and then on along the beach, round point after point past the place where we came out on the way from Diumana to Hisiu, and later on we turned into another opening in the bush, which after the glare and bright sunlight outside, was like going into a tunnel. Some two hours of this, and forcing our way through grass as tall as ourselves, brought us once more to Nara.

The next day we found the boat all safe in the creek, and a strong wind landed us at home in time to straighten up for the Sabate. The round had taken two days less than the three weeks we had arranged for.