blowing fresh it is usual to keep a man standing on the temporary
outrigger to counteract by his weight the inclination of the canoe to
leeward. From the whole sail being placed in the bow these canoes make
much leeway, but when going free may attain a maximum speed of seven or
eight knots an hour. Except in smooth water they are very wet, and the
bailer (a melon shell) is in constant requisition.

BOWS, ARROWS, SPEARS, THROWING-STICKS AND CLUBS.

The inhabitants of the mainland and Prince of Wales Islands use the spear
and throwing-stick, but throughout the remainder of Torres Strait bows
and arrows are the chief weapons. The bows, which are large and powerful,
are made of split bamboo, and the arrows of a cane procured from New
Guinea, afterwards headed with hard wood variously pointed and sometimes
barbed. The Kowraregas obtain bows and arrows from their northern
neighbours, and occasionally use them in warfare, but prefer the spears
which are made by the blacks of the mainland. We saw three kinds of spear
at Cape York; one is merely a sharpened stick used for striking fish, the
two others, tipped and barbed with bone, are used in war. The principal
spear (kalak or alka) measures about nine feet in length, two-thirds of
which are made of she-oak or casuarina, hard and heavy, and the remaining
third of a soft and very light wood; one end has a small hollow to
receive the knob of the throwing-stick, and to the other the leg-bone of
a kangaroo six inches long, sharpened at each end, is secured in such a
manner as to furnish a sharp point to the spear and a long barb besides.
Another spear, occasionally used in fighting, has three or four heads of
wood each of which is tipped and barbed with a smaller bone than is used
for the kalak.

The throwing-stick in use at Cape York extends down the North-East coast