the natives,
so we turned back and walked along the eastern side of the island one and
a half miles, with the boat in company outside. A small stream of fresh
water was found, not sufficient, however, for our wants, nor was the
place suitable for the approach of boats. The rock on Pig Island, where
exposed at some of the points, is mica slate, soft and splintery in many
places, with frequent veins of quartz. The hills,* although often running
in ridges, have a rounded outline, and the soil on the smooth grassy
places--comprising three-fourths of the island--is composed of
disintegrated rock mixed with pieces of undecomposed quartz, any
considerable accumulation of vegetable mould being probably prevented by
the heavy rains. The grass is very luxuriant without being rank; it was
not known to me, for, unlike most of the other plants, I had not met with
it in Australia. Indeed the frequency of the coconut-palm was the only
non-Malayo-Australian feature in the vegetation. As no botanist had
previously visited the Louisiade, a few of the principal plants may be
mentioned. These are Guilandina bonduc, Tournefortia argentea, Morinda
citrifolia, Paritium tiliaceum, Casuarina equisetifolia, and Clerodendrum
inerme,* among the trees and shrubs, which were often overgrown with
Lygodium microphyllum, and Disemma coccinea. The only birds seen were the
sacred kingfisher, the sulphur-crested cockatoo, and the Australian crow.
The shells on the reef were all Australian likewise, but under some
decaying logs, on the beach, I found single species of Auricula,
Truncatella, Scarabus, and Melampus.

(*Footnote. The highest part of the island, measured up to the tops of
the trees, is 479 feet.)

(**Footnote. These are all common to Polynesia, the Indian Archipelago,
and tropical Australia.)

The men we saw today were dark copper coloured, with the exception of the
spokesman, whose skin was of a light-brownish yellow hue. The hair in
nearly all was frizzled out into a mop, in some instances of prodigious
size; the light-coloured man, however, had his head closely shaved.* The
physiognomy varied much; some had a savage, even ferocious aspect. The
nose was narrower and more prominent, the mouth smaller, the lips
thinner, the eyes more distant, the eyebrows less overhanging, the
forehead higher, but not broader, than in the Australian, with whom I
naturally compared them as the only dark savage race which I had seen
much of. They used the bet