MOUNTAIN DWARFS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3181, 29 March 1911, Page 7

MOUNTAIN DWARFS.

RETURNED EXPLORER’S ACCOUNT OF AN UNKNOWN PEOPLE.

Mr Walter Goodfeliow, the omitholo- j gist invalided home from the British | exploring expedition in the unknown interior of.New-.Guinea, reached London , recently in .the steamer Breconshire. Of the expedition's discovery of an unknown race of mountain dwarfs, Air Goodfeliow amid-: “After a dozen or two had inspected) rus from afar and found . us not,quiteiso impossible as they had .at; first imagined they began to be quite V friendly;, with, us, and- before I felh ill j we had encountered at least a hundred, j Curiously .enough we nevOr saw one’ of ; their women. Whether or no the men j secreted them.from us I cannot say. “The tallest man we met was only ; four feet- .six inches, and! it was evident ! that he regarded himself as a giant. j Beautifully proportioned, many of them, i especially the "younger men, are also handsomely featured. Their skin oi light bronze is also very frequently , quite beautiful. Perhaps their greatest i failing is their entire lack of any sense ! of cleanliness. J ;am sure that layers of i dirt an inch thick could be scraped off i some of them. . , \ “With a thousand, 1 winged creatures chorusing above our heads, we hacked our way yard by yard through the forest towards our gadl—the summit of the Snow Mountains. A day’s march of . a mile or so was not to be dispised. The death of Air Wilfred Stalker, one of our Du-ty, is an. illustration of the terrors of the New Guinea forests. “Soon after wo landed Air Stalker left camp alone to go isliooting and lost himself in the jungle,. When we found his bodyin a creek some days later we noticed that his face was ternb’y scratched, as though he had been tear-ing-madly through the undergrowth. 'Probably" lie had! been overtaken by fever and become delirious.”