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To-morrow I should do as 'Parka' did the day he came to Kabaira. I must go down to the beach with a dynamite cartridge in my hand and seek for a place where there was plenty of fish. And I must have another cartridge ready in my pocket. As soon as the first shot went off hundreds of natives would jump in the water and try to steal all the best fish.
First he told me that the Kabaira people were perfectly safe; it was a very peaceful village, and the people liked white men, and he hoped I would not carry arms whenever I went out it made them frightened, and when people were frightened of a man they naturally tried to kill him. Agreed to. Secondly, they were not cannibals all their neighbours were, however.
"'In pursuance of your instructions, we called at Kabaira Bay, New Britain, to remove Mr. Harvey Carr from there to a more healthy location. We found Mr. Carr's station in a satisfactory state, and his accounts were correct. But both Captain Hendry and myself are of the opinion that Mr.
Having thus, in cheerful converse, somewhat enlightened me as to the peculiar characteristics of Kabaira Bay and its inhabitants, my friend had breakfast cooked, and whilst we were eating it, sent a messenger for his friend Bobaran to come and make the acquaintance of the new white man. During breakfast the trader gave me much further information, all of which, as a man new to the ropes, I was very glad to obtain. Kabaira, I already knew (I had but just arrived in New Britain from Eastern Polynesia), was the 'furthest out' trading station on the great island, which, at that time, had barely thirty white men living on it; most of these were settled on Gazelle Peninsula, and a few on the Duke of York Island, midway between the northern point of New Britain and mountainous New Ireland. My nearest neighbour lived at Kabakad
Between where is now the German settlement and the great native town at Kabaira Bay there is an island called Mano, which stands five miles off from the mainland.
Once, indeed, when the writer of this true story lived in New Britain, he saw this sight for a whole week, for there, in those beautiful islands, the air is very clear at certain seasons of the year. From Matupi, where the principal settlement in New Britain is situated, to the deep bay at Kabaira, fifty miles away, the coast is very beautiful.
The old lady treated us right royally, and, a few hours before we sailed, a canoe-load of fruit and drinking coco-nuts were sent off to the ship, with her compliments. When our boat touched the beach in front of the trader's house just as the dawn was breaking, I thought Kabaira Bay one of the loveliest places in the Pacific, and said so to the man I had been sent to relieve.
He seemed pleased that I was disposed to be as liberal-handed as Parker, for whom he seemed to have a high regard; and then proceeded to tell me of some of his own exploits among the inhabitants of Mutavât, a village across the bay, which was at enmity with Kabaira.
They had, he said, stolen his own son twelve months before, and eaten him, and he wanted his revenge. Presently, as a proof of his integrity, he produced from a dirty leather cartridge pouch, that was strapped around his waist, a soiled piece of paper, and handed it to the captain. It read as follows: 'The bearer, Baringa, is the chief of Kabaira Coast.
I told him that the niggers would pay him out for a-playin' crooked with em'; but he was too cock-a-hoopy to listen to a feller like me. 'Any more white men buried in Kabaira? 'I asked after a while, as we walked back to the house to take stock of my host's trade goods. 'No, that's all that's planted here at least, all I know of, and I've been here, in New Britain, five years.
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