Made photographs of Neate's gold working and treatment plantbefore the onset of the rain. Lionel returned from Kaur ai, bringing some good artifacts (betel-nut pestles and mor- tars a hammer used on the bindings of canoes and houses, an armshell, etc.) for the Museum, but his bat-hunting was an utter failure. His guides (they traveled round the coast by foot0 took him close to the entrance of a big cave opening above the sea on a cliff facebut the tide was too high and the water too rough for them to reach the cave. The cave is in a bay about 2½ miles to the northwest of the entrance to Kaurai Lagoon. Lionel will make another attempt on it from Bakoias, by canoe. A russet brown Dobsonia netted last night (a form new to the collection). One Rattus ruber in traps. Rus worked all day on specimens he left in the icebox before his departure on the abortive bathhunt, and the few things collected by his boys during his absence. Tuesday Nov. 15: Heavy rain with thunderm from 10 am to noon. We are getting a pretty regular pattern of rainfall and weather. Cloudy days turning to rain by about 10-11 am, clearing early in the afternoon, the nights clear or at least not rainy. This type of weather is good for mammal trapping and jacking, anything but the best for collecting in- volving work by day. From 7:45 to 4 o'clock on an excursion to the village of Dekoias, two hours of the time being spent in the Dekoias resthouse, sheltering from the rain. Gathered mainly second- growth plants from the garden area near the village. This is coral limestone country, of about 60 to 100 ft- elevation according to the military map, broken into irregular small ridges. There is perhaps some deficiency in the soil. For the second growths seem to be slow in growthand to stay in a scrubby state for some years. I did not see any gardens. They were back of the road. The village is a good 4 miles from Kulumadau. Nineteen dwellings, chief's yam house, rest house and barracks. Most of the houses have a dip in the roof and slightly pointed and upturned ends. The roof battens are poked through fascia boards, a feature we have not seen anywhere else. Houses are built off the ground and thatched with g sage leaf. Many of the roofs in bad repair. Floors are of soft adzed planks (palm, which is generally used in the islands for flooring, are scarce on Woodlark). Dekoias is presided over by a chief, Vass. who appears to be paramount chief for the western half of the island 9he told Lionel he controls all the island, but this is denied by Don Neate). Vass is an imposing, clean shaven , toothless manof more than medium sta- ture for a native. Must be very old. He held a distinguished service medal (Civil) for long service in the native Constabulary, dating from "about 1905." Came to meet me dressed in very clean white ramie and shirt, red [illegible] police cummerbund, and rimless Japanese sailor's cap. His house is long and sway-backed (the ordinary village dwellings are more rectangular), the front of thick adzed boards elaborately carved. A cluster of big white cowrie shells , badge of office, hangs in front of the door, suspended from the peak of the roof. Vass seems to have much affection for his withered little old wife. Called her out of the depths of the house, and she sat beside him, while I made photos. A rat in traps last nightwhich rus considers different (gray with big feet). The reddish-brown Dobsonis Rus now thinks is D. remota, previously known only from the Trobriands (Rus has no description or drawing of the species, but our animal is very distinct from any- th ing we have collected previously). This makes 17 ssp. collected on the island so far. Questioned the Dekoias village policeman on experimental plantings of rice, cocoa, coffee and pepper which Cottrell-Dormer induced the natives of the area to make. The rice op amounted to 1½ bags, which for reasons which I could not fathom, are stored in the policeman's house instead of being sold or eaten (there is no thought of using it for seed). Am not that the other crops were actually planted. However, C-D took three Dekoias boys to his agriculturak school near Samarai. Their training completed, they have returned to the village, and are doing nothing. It is not a matter of non-cooperation by the people. The villagers have not been asked to do anything. The VC says that if the ag. boys like to bestir themselves, he will sing out for the village people to do the work. He has told them off for not doing their job.