scratching against things. The wind is rising again now, and I suspect that there will not be much of a catch in the trap tomorrow after all. The books are now in balance and I think this ends tonight's entry. 10 April. As I suspected the gale last night kept all little bugs our of the light- trap and the cupboard was bare this morning. Just one moth which had blundered somehow - showing off its against-wind provess to its girl-friend, I expect. Two events enlivened the afternoon, three to be exact. First I sent Niko and Bili out with dipping nets to get a few of the little fish I had seen in the little creeks and they came back loaded with them; old John Nichols of the Fish Dept. should be delighted. The second and third were the return of Len, Ken, Van and the boys, and the snake in Gussie's garden; I'll take them in reverse order, as I was on my way to meet Len, Ken and Van having arrived, when I was hailed by Gussie who was parncing around among about sixteen boys screaming. A snake had jumped at him out of a shed and would I please do something about it. One of the boys had it pinned down with a stick and I stepped on its head but had nothing to pick it up with; I felt around a little gingerly because, having my foot on it. and told the boy to get out of the way, I could not see where its neck ended and its head began. However, I got it home and dumped it in formalin. This morning I compared it with the book and suspect that it is a mulga snake (Pseudochis papuanus), somewhat veno- mous, but I knew that last night anyway. It was rather good to have the others back again and Ken had made a successful climb of Maneau and thinks we shall not have too much difficulty. He is making an official record of the climb which I shall attach to my own copy of this journal. We stayed up until almost 2200 hours planning our route up and think that, on account of the shortage of water, we shall not make a main camp on this summit; that can be covered by a sub-camp from the topmost main camp, and water may offer quite a problem at other points as some of the creeks Ken found will undoubtedly be dried up. That we must handle when the time comes. Van did well with the caves and Len got lots of new plants but I am glad to state that they did not even see the famous "Bottle-nosed snake". I have been counting on getting that ever since I first heard of it, and it would have broken my heart if one of the others got it because I was forced by admin affairs to remain behind that time. I and some of the others will be going probably to the caves at Dabora and those at Tapio in about a couple of weeks and I hope to emerge with friend bottle-nose. Cuttwell actually called it "bottle-shaped" but we could not figure out what kind of bottle he had in mind and it has been altered in our references. 11 April. One of the first things Ken tackled this morning was the forearm of my shotgun. What a thing it is to have a mechanical mind. He took a lot of screws, springs and other gadgets out of it, fashioned a spring stopper out of the top of a fruit tin, oiled the thing, put it together again, and it works. But it is the last time that forearm comes off, provided I can see Niko before he gets at it again. It has been a fairly busy morning with odd jobsand Ken has promised the boys a party this evening. He is giving them half a case of bully beef and some navy biscuits but of that more anon. Later, same night. The locals arrived in full force, tail feathers, headdresses, drums, chants and everything, and our boys, their hosts, ignored them during the dancing, each doing his own particular brand. Keem, the cook, was some sort of Master of Ceremonies and equipped himself with a long wand, to the end of which was attached a bunch of feathers. He would wave it, first in time with the music, then graciously over the dancers, and finally would rush back to the fire and stir the tea with the non-feathered end. A good time was had by everybody and I turned in about 2200 and slept soundly through the last part of the chanting, drumming, screaming and dancing. Sunday 12 April. Yesterday we received, I found out somewhat later since I was doing something else when it arrived, a quite pressing invitation to go to Baniara today to visit the Patrol Officers, Peter and Tony; it ended with Peter saying that he would be glad to do anything for us, either great or small. Van was still busy with the things he brought back from the caves at Dabora and did not feel