Taming Papua

Slow But Steady Progress Tribes Mixing Freely Under White Protection

(From Our Own Correspondent )

Port Moresby, Aug. 25.

IT is an accepted idea generally that the white man, by taking possession of a country owned by an inferior dark skinned race, has invariably rob bed the natives of many of their privi leges and customs and given them little in return as compensation.

Papua has often been cited as an example, and there may appear to be justification in some instances, as in the prohibition of customs sacred to some tribes, head-hunting and canni balism, which the Government has felt it advisable to suppress.

The other side is worth considering before we accept the general idea.

Every village or district in Papua, however small, had its safety zone, or “no man’s land.” Forty or so years ago, even Port Moresby’s large native vil lage, Hanuabada, now a civilised com munity, was restricted in this way.

There was little safety for the natives who wandered outside their village bounds unarmed or in small parties, as any hunting party would attack them and drag them to their village or camp, where their fate would be as the tribal chief thought fit.

To-day, except in unexplored regions or among the most truculent tribes, the horror of these conditions has entirely vanished. Natives wander peacefully from district to district in safety, as sured of the protection the white man’s government affords them. This condi tion in itself raises the native to a higher level, which should compensate him for his former grotesque and gruesome customs and give him a freer and livelier existence.

It is natural that, from time to time, these people revert to their former customs, and occasional raids are made on defenceless natives. The Govern ment in these cases takes matters into it own hands and gives ample justice to the injured tribes, though, perhaps, not on the same lines as they would wish. Their former methods of re prisal could hardly be justified. It will no doubt take many years for them to understand the Government’s methods, which leave them unsatisfied and wondering.

Methods Of Inter-Tribal

Trading

In the Upper Purari River conditions of 50 years ago still prevail, though they are gradually disappearing. The “no man’s land” between the Koriki, a Delta tribe, and the Kuku-Kukus, a nomadic hill tribe, is a vast domain, many hundreds of square miles in extent, and though these people do not openly raid to the same extent as formerly, yet their methods of com munication with one another are still crafty and secretive.

One very enlightening custom gives a good idea of their watchfulness and of the suspicion with which they regarded one another.

From time to time, for years past, parties of Korikis travel up the Purari River as far as they consider safe, which is the junction of the Purari and Varoe Rivers, their imaginary boun dary. There they deposit trade goods in some deserted Kuku-Kuku hut.

They return later on to find, as they expect, their goods taken and replaced by trade of the Kuku-Kuku tribe.

This is generally taro, native veget ables, tobacco and sugar cane. These they collect and depart as silently and secretly as possible, not seeing one another nor holding any communica tion whatever —far too timid and sus picious of each other to risk a meeting or to make any advances.

Up to a few years ago this was the condition these natives lived un der. It is now known that the nomads are shyly making advances and mixing at intervals, without hostility, with natives from the coast, employed on the rivers under white supervision.

This is due to the feeling of security the Government has given them and to the organised patrols into the interior by white officials, accompanied by nat ive police.

Gradually, the feeling of security will spread, and within this generation it may be possible for all natives in Papua to mix freely, without fear of their stronger neighbours.

Formerly, tribes more powerful than others had pushed their weaker neigh bours before them into swamps and hidden water-ways, to perish or to exist in privation, as in the case of the Delta tribes. Until the white man came there was little security in their exist ence.