Show 00 1 VV k N A za Z aj A y A now new guinea woman and baby Pr prepared pared by the Nation si bookety Boo lety D C HE most unspoiled savage THU co country la in the world today ably y Is in the huge island of 0 new guinea 1101 holland land great britain and germany who divided the island among them on paper in 1885 did little more than place a I 1 tenuous fringe of outposts and m s blona along the coast the spacious spa cloua interior has been left largely to the numerous wild tribes whose w hose chief outdoor sport Is collecting human head and who riot not infrequently make cannibal feasts oft off the remainder of their enemies anatomy this out of the way island with its thousands of square miles of unexplored territory has been and continues to be an interesting field to the geographer the naturalist and the lie anthropologist as well veil as to pollyl tons lans statesmen find and traders count ing australia as a continent T new ew guinea Is exceeded in size among file islands only liy by ley icy gi greenland een land and it may therefore be said bald to lie be the largest island in the world w aich sup ports a considerable population the number of the inhabitants Is 18 not bitely known but Is believed belied to be close to one million the island Is miles illes southeast of the ha philippines and in the latitude of the eastern bulge of brazil the equator lies about twenty miles off its northern most point this huge island of the tropic seas covers a greater area than half a dozen or more commonwealths of the unit united ed states it if it could be laid down with its southernmost poin tat norfolk va it would extend across virginia west virginia ohio andl ona ana michigan wisconsin minnesota find and most ot of north dakota its northernmost point resting near the cann dlan border not far from the mon tuna form line and at its greatest great pst width it would extend from near the northern end of lake michigan to a point just south of terre haute ind the area Is close to square miles new guinea was first discovered by portuguese and spanish ad adventure ventur ers of the sixteenth century the old sea captains are said to have hae given plan the island its name because ot of the fancied resemblance of its people to the natives native s of I 1 guinea on the african const australia has more than half later dutch and english sude ceded to the claims of the first comers at present new guinea Is roughly divided into two political halves by the one hundred forty first meridian of longitude the part facing borneo and java Is under dutch administration lethe rest Is ii governed by its southern sou thein neighbor australia australia has baa a keen interest in new guinea for it lies hardly a hundred ralles miles to the north and the strait separating the two lands Is dotted with ft ath small islands since 1900 the southwestern quarter of the island has been a territory of the federal government of australia and after the world war australia Austi alla was given a man mandate ditte for the former german territory thus australia now has jurisdiction over more than halt half the island british and dutch portions of the island are alike in having a little known and comparatively untapped interior high mountain ranges rise to the reign of perpetual snow and great rivers flow to the coast although new guinea lies close to the equator a variety of temperatures Is afforded by her range in altitude there Is very little change from month to month however at a particular altitude papuans are pagans the papuan cautiously approaches the rocks on tito the shores of 0 the th ocean and inland streams lest it a spirit that abides there ealr up a storm A spirit in the clouds destroys their children but the strung strong rat spirit lurks lu in tho the forest for this reason leason tribesmen seldom venture out at night capua auti puti villages are built more for than comfort near the te fi joaie chaet and rivers many of them aro built over oer the water while in the interior they occupy the hills bills where chere the th tribesmen can survey the neighbor hood for or enemy invaders if a village Is in a valley alley it Is usually protected by a high stockade or the huts buts aarein are in t the lie tree atiee tops tree platforms are aie the tribal watchtowers watch towers natives always fighting constant fighting among the papu hapu nils ans has caused a shortage of men so n women onion do the courting when a tr tribesman arbesman Is capt hated by a papuan lass lie he gives his prospective father inlaw in law liw a pig or a dog and takes his bride bilde to his hut the wedding ceremony over 01 er the bride bilde jolas joins the other lives in taking care of the hut and working the garden while the hus hand goes fighting hunting and fla fish fl A log yams bams sweet potatoes birds lizards floii and all kinds of insects are aie eaten by the natives turtles are a I 1 luxury ux ur y to them but the favorite tidbit Is a fat grub about three inches long halmans differ as to the disposal of their dead they believe that eich each tribesman has two spirits one dies with the body while the other remains with it to harint the relatives lathea le sometimes a body la is buried bulled for a short time later it Is 13 disinterred and hones bones cleaned and taken to the village some tribes dry the body on a plat form and keep it a few years sears then it Is buried bulled and a house built over the grave grae tor for the spirit A path Is cut from the hut to the nearest stream so that the spirit may bathe and food Is brought to the dead for a time so that tho the journey to the spirit world will not be made on an empty stomach papuan women keep their hus bus bands alive as long as possible for when one tribesman dies all his wives are tabu wearing widows wee weeds ds in new guinea la Is literally true for papuan widows doff their short knee length grass dresses and strings of bends beads for grass gowns that cover coer their bodies from their shoulders to their feet feel the coastal regions of new guinea practically the only potions po well v oil known are typical topical tropical innis and as might be expected are not particularly healthful the mountains of the interior reach a consider considerable a ble height one peak in the dutch portion of the island being more than COO feet higher than mt lit whitney the highest peak in the united states proper their origin a puzzle where the papuans Papu ans the he natives of new guinea originated Is an unsettled point among ethnologists the inhabitants of most of the adjacent islands are relatively fair air straight haired malays balays but the papuans are black wooly haired negroes like those of the faraway far away guinea coast conat of africa it was because of this similarity that the name new guinea was wag given to the island some of the tap pap units have become mix mixed edwith with balays malays so that numerous racial gradations exist the papuan deenis to demand on in elevated home throughout the north ern era and eastern portion of the islands tha file houses many of them vast communal dwellings are erected on piles in the southwestern section many of cf the native tribes live in rude huts hut built in trees though on the whole as tit it any people in the world the par ians are not devoid of good traits some of the tribes have it a passion for cleanliness and believe that the spirits of their departed tribesmen lovs to bielie bit lie they therefore carefully con paths leading each grave to the sea some of the near the northeast coast are literally villages beautt beautiful rul they raif j aro are clean swept with streets ria tided idd and plant ed cd with ornamental shrubs shi uba jn the center are little iiii iiii or palaver spots where aie ahi held hed these tire are paved with 1 I noer toalei joslee lslie which are erected eruct sl tu vilura to tervo servo its as back resta |