(33) November 1 The steamer came in early and shoved off for Tulagi and Sydney at 11, taking all our mail which has kept us busy for the past two days. Mr. Beck sent a few small boxes to the Museum by par- cel post. I got letters of to Drs. Murphy and Sanford. Helped a bit with the stores after lunch, purchasing a lot of stuff for myself including 12 sq. feet of waterproof canvas for a hammock awning. Af- ter evening kai the most estimable Rev. Tutty and his colleague Rev. Peacock came aboard from the A V Melanesia, the official 7-Day Ad- vect craft; they rigged up a benzine magic-lantern aft and showed 100 slides, many of exceptional interest, dealing with native life and missionary work on Vella Lavella, the 7-Day stronghold, Bougain- ville, New Georgia, and Malaita. Rev. Peacock, by the way assisted in the burial of Mr. Bell, the recently murdered D.O. of Malaita. In 12 years this mission has made remarkable progress; starting on Vella Lavella they have used natives extensively in propagating their doctrine on other islands. Problems of health, sanitation, and educa- tion were undertaken first (after the church had been built). They have no commercial interests like Rev. Goldie and his Methodist clan. Things of most practical value are taught the natives such as the cultivation of sweet corn and other vegetables. We were supplied with excellent garden products at Kumbakota on Ganonga where the 7-Day station was originated and has always been operated by natives. The ethnology of the exhibit proved very interesting. Head-houses, burial biers and crematoriums, canoe-houses, and heathen ornaments were shown, all revealing sun and moon worship which brings to mind Dr. Fox's "Threshold of the Pacific" and its thesis, based on ethnographical re- search, that Egypt was the original migratory center for the Solomons. According to Rev. Tutty, who appended many remarks, the natives them- selves do not realize that they worship the sun and moon. Its prin- cipal significance to them is tradition and regard of ancestors, all of which amounts fundamentally to ghost-fear. The only elements of this culture they can understand and trace are their totems. The sto- ries of their origin as a people from some bird or fish are handed down by mouth and tattooed on their bodies in many cases, so that the whole constitutes a primal folk-lore. Why the pyre of a funeral bier must be lighted just at sunrise is a mystery to them, the sig- nificance of the sun being disregarded; but the story of the shark that turned into a man or the woman who gave birth to an alligator, thus giving rise to a tribe, remains in original entity. Language is the first category of education. The missionaries have to work now in three distinct languages and eighteen dialects, the principal one of which is New Georgia. They teach reading and writing phonetically, acting on two principles: vowel following a consonant and two diph- thongs- ei and ae. The boys at Batuna in the Marovo Lagoon print and bind bibles and prayer-books for use anywhere that the 7-Day is es- tablished. In medicine they have done a great deal, all charitably. Members of the regular church in Australia, England, etc., give one- tenth of their incomes for the benefit of foreign missions, which is the first cause of the 7-Day advance. Of all the missions out here the French Catholic is the most respected by the white people; and of the Protestant, the 7-Day. The little lecture closed appropriately with a representation of the expected second coming of the Saviour. Mr. Beck showed our most interesting birds and acquired much information concerning anchorages around New Georgia, Bougainville, and Choiseul.