L. 14, P. 5 got two punctures and some bruises on his hands during the process, which we washed thoroughly in strong lysol solution afterwards. Thur. Apr. 23. This morning Blue is still feeling pretty sick, but that may be from the salt and water which he had to swallow. He is of course absolutely empty too, but no doubt a meal now will brace him up considerably. Two Melomys and two Rattus in traps; also a little boy brought us a Pipistrellus bat. The boys are skinning the large wallaby brought in last night. In the afternoon took the trail east of the hill which Brass has described as leading out by the nearest way to the savannas. Found them well developed tree-savannas. Birds by no means plentiful. Tracks of wallaby rarely and of bandicoot quite a lot in soft spots on the trail. Got back at 4.45 in time to listen for Daru. Archbold came through by voice which was barely understandable through the noise of the power generator which he was using. I got only part of what he said, among which were: the Veriveri can get to us at the earliest on the 25th, that the plane is due back tomorrow (24th), that everything, including radio, got very wet when he and Rand went out to the reef. Found that Bahliss had been true to his promise of the morning and had brought in two of the little "scrub wallabies", little blackish things that live in woods instead of savannas. I don't remember whether I have noted that "scrub" in the Australian sense means forest, and "bush" means tree-savanna. Fri. Apr. 24. This morning only one raté, a Melomys. Relying on Archbold's statement that the "Veriveri" could not possibly come before the 25th, I had another bunch of traps set a couple of miles out from here in the tree savanna. In the afternoon two specimens, male and female of Zaglossus, the spiny anteater or egg-laying porcupine were brought to me. Skinning them took up the rest of the boys' time for most of the p.m.. Traps were rebaited however. About 5 ock. we heard the engine of the "Veriveri", a day ahead of the time given last night by Archbold. Tonight's radio (by voice of Archbold) was virtually unintelligible on account of the noise sent out by his generator. Morse in my opinion is absolutely "de rigueur" with that set-up. Sat. Apr. 25. Brass and I had packed up most of our specimens the eveing before, and when the boys had brought back the traps we soon finished matters that yet remained to be completed. I called a pay parade among the villagers who had brought me specimens from time to time, and they were paid off with shillings or sticks of tobacco as seemed appropriate for the services rendered. Then the boys carried everything down to the Port and out by boat to the "veri veri". We had hardly become established before rain began; and worse still the native engineer had to take out all the spar plugs and clean them before he could start the engine. Meanwhile the rain fell in sheets before a strong southeast wind and every seam in the deck poured water in upon us. We atlength opened a tent-fly belonging to the expedition and covered the entire upper works. Not until after eleven oclock did the ancient vessel get under way, and once outside we hauled up sails and tacked steadily against the gusty breeze. Along in the afternoon the showers moderated and toward evening we sailed under a fairly clear sky. And at seven oclock the engine stopped: we had run out of gas. Brass and I damned somebody's carelessness in sending out a boat for us which had only a single case of "benzene" aboard. Meanwhile we had just sighted the treetops of daru above the horizon. During the night we tacked steadily against a light but unintermittent east breeze. Showers fell at intervals and everything got pretty wet. And down was very uncomfortable with eleven of our own boys and a crew of four other Papuans, so Brass and I stayed on deck with a blanket apiece