Telepathy—or What?

Bush Telegraph, Telepathy—or What?

Mysterious Incidents Among Papuan Natives.

By Henry Dexter, Milne Bay, Papua.

A PARTY of “old-timers” were recently sitting on the verandah of a trading store in Milne Bay, Papua, and, arising out of experiences related by three of them, the question was asked: “Is it not possible that certain races have retained powers call them mediumistic if you like —that have been lost by the white races”?

“How can you otherwise explain this?” said one of them.

“I was R.M. at the time, in Samarai.

McAlpine was A.R.M. The latter had gone across to Bubuleta to enquire into the death by drowning of a man named Frank Cameletto. This man had fallen overboard from his cutter and was drowned.

“While McAlpine was holding the en quiry the natives came to him and asked if it were true that Dekawaia had been killed by a falling tree? Dekawaia was a native of Bubuleta, and had at one time been village constable there. He had recently been sent to work on Woodlark Island.

“McAlpine, of course, said he had heard nothing of Dekawaia being killed; but a native persisted that such was the case.

“When McAlpine entered the office, next day, he asked me if in the mail from Woodlark Island that I was then sorting, there was any news of the na tive, Dekawaia. I replied, ‘No, not so far.’ But at the bottom of the bag there was a hurried pencilled note from Fitz gerald, the Customs Officer on Wood lark Island, reporting the death of the man in question. He had been killed by a falling tree!

“When Armit died at Tamata, on the N.E. coast, he was 400 miles away from Samarai. He died at 9 a.m. Yet his death was known to the natives in Samarai at 3 p.m. the same day.”

Another old-timer referred to the death of Mrs. Baldwin (a lady univer sally esteemed by both natives and whites) in Port Moresby. Residents in the west, hundreds of miles away, told of the wailing of the natives because “the big Sinabada had died.”

“Have you ever seen a native step aside as if he had seen a snake on the track?” said another man. “You ask him why he did so. He will tell you he ‘saw the shadow of a spirit’.”

The storekeeper related an experience of his own. “I was doing a short patrol in 1915, inland from Abau. We were camped for the night on a razorback, to get some rest away from the mosquitoes.

My corporal came to me and said there had been a fight near the Fly River, and his brother was among the killed. In answer to a query of mine he said no whites were concerned in the fight. His story proved, later, to be correct.”

Now, all the above experiences dated back 18 to 25 years, but among those present was a Government official, still in the service, and this was his story.

“I was camped on a small island about 14 miles from headquarters, in the Tro briands. The island is small, and the in habitants have very little in the way of gardens; they appear to live mostly on

presents—possibly a kind of tribute— given them by natives living in neigh bouring islands. There is no rest house there. I was camped in the small village itself.

“At 8 p.m. I heard a voice ask, ‘Did you see Marion go?’ Two other voices entered into a conversation about the passing of Marion.

“Now, I knew the girl Marion was in hospital at headquarters, 14 miles away.

On my return there, I sent a chit over to the doctor, asking for news of Marion.

His reply was that she had died the previous evening at 8 p.m.”

Among the thousands of readers of the P.I. Monthly there must be many who have had similar experiences to the above. This is written in the hope that they will relate them.

The sloop of the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy, H.M.S. “Veronica,” commanded by Captain W. L. Jackson, will arrive at Levuka, Fiji, on an Islands cruise on September 23. After remain ing there until September 25, she will proceed to Suva.