unpacking being completed and the tent for the boys erected. Each of us has his own tent, such as it is, with table and chair, but somewhat crowded by the fact that each of us has taken in a certain number of expedition boxes and in addition to my boxes, I have the stores of tobacco and rum. Work should start tomorrow and conditions will be good and easy for the first period, the time we spend at Lockerbie. Later we shall start the subsidiary camps, of which the first probably will be somewhere on the eastern side of the Peninsula, either in the district of Somerset or about the mouth of "acky Jacky. Later we shall most likely make another camp in the Mutee Head district and perhaps one as far south as the Jardine River. George is busy trying to explain in pidgin how to set traps. I am quite certain he would make much better progress if he used ordinary English. It is the pidgin that puzzles them, not the traps. In a few minutes Jetty Joe will be banging on his dishpan to indicate that another of his enticing meals is ready for consumption. I wish I could write George's pidgin, which is directed mainly at George Moreton, henceforth to be known as Moreton. It runs something like this "I show you, you use dis hand. Put the wire in the hole with dis hand." Then suddenly he forgets his pidgin "Go slow. Mind the spring. Go slow, take it easy, now you have it." Then a mixture "Tomorrow morning you take out five traps and set them. Then go lookum see." No wonder poor Moreton looks bewildered. Len has just returned from the cook-house; supper will be in about fifteen minutes so it is time for the cocktail hour and I must stop. Thursday, 22 April 1948. It is still before mid-day but there is a chance of getting mail out this evening so I want to finish this page. Some of the equipment never reached shore from the Lochiel and I want to find out just what. Also I have to check the B-P supplies, having found out that they substituted on the tobacco and soap without informing us about it. For the record, Jetty Joe went on the payroll as of the 20th, at an all- inclusive salary pf L9-0-0 weekly; during a discussion with him yesterday after- noon, he asked me to hold his full salary unless he asks for it. There will be quite a party when Joe really breaks out, I guess. Ginger Dick borrowed my rifle last evening and went out and shot a bullock so we had good steaks for breakfast this morning. The animals were originally domestic but for several years have been running wild, are unbranded and free for the taking. If the mammalogists don't stop bringing in specimens for me, when I least want them, I shall go out and get a cow and tell them to skin it. In the evening we went over to the house and listened to a quiz contest between Australia and Great Britain, followed by the news. Dick had heard in a previous newscast that Walter Reuther, the automobile Union boss, had been shot, but there was no mention of it in the news we heard. Sleeping was good and cool, though the day heat goes up around 95 degrees. Len and George got out for a while this morning and Moreton, as a result of George's pidgin talk, brought in one mouse. George's response to that was "You one fine-feller boy, it's a Melomys". Moreton just grinned. There is a boat coming in from T.I. which will take our mail back there for mailing and may bring some in to us as the weekly plane reached Thursday Island yesterday.