Friday October 5: Beautiful fine day, the only day, I think, we have had here without rain. No rain last night. Took advantage of the day to climb a peak which rises about 1000 feet to the ENE of camp. Was out nearly six hours. Followed a trail out by our boys. Good rain forest with a scattering of very big trees; undergrowth very poor; found no big tree in flower, only a few in fruit. A Metrosideros? with reddish yellow young leaves is a common big tree on the ridge crest of the top. Also collected, in fruit, a Podocarpus of the norifolius group. Smallish trees of an oak occurred in some abundance on top, but all were sterile. My chief reason for climbing the peak was to collect the cal. Nothing again in traps. Rus and the boys jacked last night and got nothing. A nother Melomys came in, however. A young one grabbed by hand by Tinker at the Neglected to record yesterday that Lionel brought in five specimens of a small Hipposideros swatted in a rock crevice in which he sheltered from the rain on the way down from the mountain. Hugh, returning from his trading trip, brought 16 more collected somewhere in Yongga Bay. The Melomys here (if it is Melomys) is a very different one - a single specimen - on Sudest. Ron Osborne had dinner with us. Tomorrow he will take Lionel to Lou or Asele Island, off the eastern end of Rossel, to trap and shoot. Rats are reported to be very plentiful there. The Osbornes have most of the island planted with coconuts. Have decided to spend what time we can at Jinju after we work the mountain. It might be better for mammals than Abeleti has proved to be. Arranged this morning for Hugh to take (us) round to Jinju, for a start up the mountain, next Thursday. This afternoon there was radio news that the "Muniara" has been delayed in sailing from Samarai and will not be here until about tomorrow week. For some reason, not clear to me at the moment, the Osbornes appear reluctant to transport us to Jinju until after the Muniara has been here. I think they want to spend all available time in trading on other parts of the coast. Have been reading "A wreck and scenes of cannibalism at Rossel Island in the Louisiades Archipelago? Melanesia," by V. de Rochas" published in the "Tour de Monde" at Paris, 1861," a translation on loan from the Osbornes. De Rochas claims to have visited Rossel with the rescue ship which was sent from New Caledonia to pick up the Chinese (327) of the three-master "Saint Paul", which was wrecked in 1856. He tells a gruesome story of stacks of pigtails and clothing found at the spot where the Chinese, in small boats, were alleged to have been killed. Have also read a typewritten account, by Frank Osborne, of the "salvaging of the 'E.S. Inaho Meru,'" a Japanese steamer of 2250 tons which went ashore on the barrier reef near Adele Island on 5 January, 1922. Sunday Oct. 6: Heavy rain for some time ending at dawn. Another fine day after that, with heavy showers, however, up the valley. Cloud drift from east. For some days now the sea has been calm, with not much break on the barrier reef. We seem to have come to the end of the strong SE winds, and to be entering the doldrum period between the two main seasons. Worked in camp while the boys did a morning in the field; Again not a thing in traps, even in some set on the Osborne's store across the river, which is said to be well populated with rats of some kind. Nothing jacked last night. Nothing on the mammal table this morning. I find that it will not be convenient for the Osbornes to take us to Jinju until after the departure of the "Muniara." They wish to collect all the copra they can, by trade and from their plantations (right aggregating about 300 acres) before the boat comes. Lionel and Hugh departed about mid-morning for Adele Island in the Wei-wei.