Immediately On Our Arrival At Muka, I Engaged A Small Boat And
Three Natives To Go In Search Of My Lost Men, And Sent One Of My
Own Men With Them To Make Sure Of Their Going To The Right
Island.
In ten days they returned, but to my great regret and
disappointment, without the men.
The weather had been very bad,
and though they had reached an island within sight of that in
which the men were, they could get no further. They had waited
there six days for better weather, and then, having no more
provisions, and the man I had sent with them being very ill and
not expected to live, they returned. As they now knew the island,
I was determined they should make another trial, and (by a
liberal payment of knives, handkerchiefs, and tobacco, with
plenty of provisions) persuaded them to start back immediately,
and make another attempt. They did not return again till the 29th
of July, having stayed a few days at their own village of Bessir
on the way; but this time they had succeeded and brought with
them my two lost men, in tolerable health, though thin and weak.
They had lived exactly a month on the island had found water, and
had subsisted on the roots and tender flower-stalks of a species
of Bromelia, on shell-fish. and on a few turtles' eggs. Having
swum to the island, they had only a pair of trousers and a shirt
between them, but had made a hut of palm-leaves, and had
altogether got on very well. They saw that I waited for them
three days at the opposite island, but had been afraid to cross,
lest the current should have carried them out to sea, when they
would have been inevitably lost. They had felt sure I would send
for them on the first opportunity, and appeared more grateful
than natives usually are for my having done so; while I felt much
relieved that my voyage, though sufficiently unfortunate, had not
involved loss of life.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
WAIGIOU.
(JULY TO SEPTEMER 1860.)
THE village of Muka, on the south coast of Waigiou, consists of a
number of poor huts, partly in the water and partly on shore, and
scattered irregularly over a space of about half a mile in a
shallow bay. Around it are a few cultivated patches, and a good
deal of second-growth woody vegetation; while behind, at the
distance of about half a mile, rises the virgin forest, through
which are a few paths to some houses and plantations a mile or
two inland. The country round is rather flat, and in places
swampy, and there are one or two small streams which run behind
the village into the sea below it. Finding that no house could be
had suitable to my purpose, and hawing so often experienced the
advantages of living close to or just within the forest, I
obtained the assistance of half-a-dozen men; and having selected
a spot near the path and the stream, and close to a fine fig-
tree, which stood just within the forest, we cleared the ground
and set to building a house.
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