MODE OF WARFARE ILLUSTRATED.

Occasionally hostilities, frequently caused by the most trivial
circumstances, arise between two neighbouring tribes, when incursions are
made into each other's territories, and reprisals follow. Although timely
notice is usually given prior to an aggression being made by one tribe
upon another, yet the most profound secrecy is afterwards practised by
the invaders. As an illustration of their mode of warfare, in which
treachery is considered meritorious in proportion to its success, and no
prisoners are made, except occasionally, when a woman is carried
off--consisting chiefly in a sudden and unexpected attack, a short
encounter, the flight of one party and the triumphant rejoicings of the
other on their return--I may state the following on the authority of
Giaom.

About the end of 1848, an old Kowrarega man went by himself in a small
canoe to the neighbourhood of Cape Cornwall, while the men of the tribe
were absent turtling at the eastern end of Endeavour Strait. He was
watched by a party of Gomokudin blacks or Yigeiles, who, guided by his
fire, surprised and speared him. Immediately returning to the mainland,
the perpetrators of this savage deed made a great fire by way of
exultation. Meanwhile the turtling party returned, and when it became
known that the old man had been missing for several days, they were
induced by his two sons to search for him, and found the body horribly
mutilated, with many spears stuck into it to show who had been the
murderers. This explained the fire, so another was lit in reply to the
challenge, and at night a party of Kowraregas in six canoes, containing
all the men and lads of the tribe, crossed over to the main. They came
upon a small camp of Yigeiles who had not been at all concerned in the