L. 25, P. 14. Everybody was dead tired. We had traveled from 8 to 11, 1 to 4, and 7.30 to midnight, or 10½ hours. Wed. Dec. 30. This morning is clear and fine again. It was a bit hard to get the boys started, everybody being a bit stiff and inert, but we got clear about 6.30. The tide had been running out for two hours already. Picked up Gaindi the Jaro boy who is supposed to know so much about the country and to have so much influence with the natives. He had walked across yesterday from Tarara to take his wife back home before joining me. Passed the mouth of the Jari River (not Jaro Creek) which comes into the Mai Kussa from the east at 7.00 a. m. One of my two canoe boys is said to be mad. He may only have a cleft palate, but whatever is the matter he is not just like the rest of natives. He is a good-natured old fellow, a big man who seems to be getting bald - an unusual thing in a native, and he wears a frontal headband of cassowary plumes. He is a tireless paddler and yesterday proved to be a perfect tower of strength, taking the canoe up the last lap of Jaro Creek almost under his own power. With that storm yesterday we got caught on a lee shore. We had had to go in there against the SE and tide, and besides it was the only possible place to get in through the mangroves. Then the west wind with its sheets caught us and rubbed the outriggers pretty hard against the mangrove roots. It was well too that we had put the big fly up. Even in that relatively small river a bit of sea was kicked up by the wind, so we'll have to proceed pretty cautiously going south down the main Mai Kussa from Sevidiru to Buji. We'll be going down the east shore I suspect. And these storms come on in the afternoons. 3 a. m. Have done well so far: 2½ hours down the SE arm to where the river turns east, and where the cross-branch (Awori Creek) cuts away to SW to join the Wassi Kussa. We are being helped a bit though by a light W breeze which catches our shelter fly and blows us along. The tide is of course still with us. From the above we zig-zagged ESE, reaching Gija, the new village noted on the way up the river at 12.45, just at the time we began to feel the effect of the newly rising tide. Our arrival created quite a sensation: Drums were beaten, boys started dancing around in a ring, shells were blown. Then the figure of the village policeman dressed in the conventional uniform appeared at the waterside to welcome us. I got a little house assigned to me and the boys yet another. After settling down a bit I took a good walk to look over their regular water supply, which is a good mile away. In wet weather they get a little water closer. These people formerly lived at Bellivi which is now deserted, the policeman who came walking with me and speaks a few words of English, told me. The all-pervading limestone is here too. There is a much weathered exposure just at the landing. Took a lot of pictures of the people. They are planting taro, bananas, pawpaws, etc. right in the village still, also coconuts. But they have mature gardens which must have been set going some long time ago, as I bought about 50 lbs. of yams and bananas this afternoon. The present population seems to reach about 20 adult men and rather less women, few children, three or four pigs and a dozen lean dogs. The country behind the village is fairly heavily "treed" tree-savanna. Saw large fan-palms and a narrow-leaved Pandanus, the latter bordering a drainage raving. Limestone appeared at the water place too. Noticed how some of these people are opportunists: a number of yams being roasted against a treestump in the clearing, thus gradually getting rid of the stump. Thur. Dec. 31. Away at 6.30. Collected specimen of limestone.