The word "appurtenances" which I used a while ago might seem to hold the difference between these natives and ourselves to be in the matter of property. This is pretty true as far as property, having it or lacking it, is an indication of striving and seeking, and not yielding. And as it seems that civilizations, unlike individuals, must be graded according to what kind of properties they totter about with them, so it follows that the tessellated society of Bougainville does not epitomize an eminent civilization. On first acquaintance, as I have said before elsewhere, the Bougainville Kanaka is not engaging from any point of view. His apparent state of poverty and lack of the essential implements of husbandry precipitate an instinctive contempt in a civilized person. The contempt is instinctinve, not reflective, and would have more often worn off white people if the Kanaka, on his part, did not naturally distrust them and exchange what few elemental good manners he possesses for a studied sullenness whenever white people appear. After the shyness and strainedness slipped out of the atmosphere here in Kupei (it took a couple of weeks) all the spontaneous human qualities which have been denied in the Kanaka began to appear upon him. Laughter and joking in the morning, humming by the fire or gazing out on the stars at night; loyalty to us as our hunting companions, slight jealousy of one another, the desire to laugh it off and forget when an episode