Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

    "The area immediately surrounding Port Moresby is a bald spot in the proliferating thatch that covers most of New Guinea....

    "Only two miles down the shore was a typical Papuan village.  It was composed entirely of shacks made of unfinished saplings and built up on stilts, most of which stood in the shallow water off the shore.  The walls and roof of such huts are made of thatched grass.  The design may have been for protection from enemies, enabling quick flight in canoes, or possibly as a sanitary measure.... 

    "One eager fellow who knew a few words of English led me to his house, which I entered by climbing about 10' up a broad ladder of loosely fastened poles, worn to a hard slippery surface and awkwardly far apart.  The only source of light was the doorway and at the far end of the dark interior, I saw an old woman sitting by a fire which apparently rested on the wooden floor.  She was cooking nothing, and it was a blistering hot day.  The fire must have been some kind of bright comfort, or perhaps it was being preserved for later meals, possibly for want of matches to start a new one.

    "A few yams stood in a corner, and a shelf hung from the under side of the roof on wires, but for these items and a disintegrating shotgun, the room was quite bare.  My host made it known that he had no shells for the gun and would like to beg a few, yet, as I left the village and rejoined others in the ship's company, he contrived to cross the path ahead of us and lope along, holding his weapon as if in readiness.  Now and then he stole a glance out of the corner of his eye, as if to make sure that the picture of the mighty hunter going forth with the only fowling piece in town was not lost on us.

    "The grim bareness of the village dwellings was in sharp contrast to the structures called dubas, which stood in what might be called the road--it was almost indistinguishable from the surrounding landscape.  These dubas were made simply: four posts about 8' or 10' tall supported a flat roof and were covered with bright-hued decoration.  Each post bore a finial in the shape of a crab claw, which is also the shape of the sail of their canoes and catamarans.  The whole was ornamented with carving and painting similar to that found on the totem poles of certain North American Indians along the northwest coast of North America.  We were told these structures had a religious significance, which led me to think that the bunches of bananas and coconuts hung from the roof were possibly offerings to the local deities."  [pp. 219-20]

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© Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts; reproduced by permission of the publisher.