think, be doubted. Upon examining the neighbourhood of the point of
contact between the New Guinea-men and the Australians, we find Cape York
and the neighbouring shores of the mainland occupied by genuine and
unmixed Australians, and the islands of Torres Strait with the adjacent
coast of New Guinea by equally genuine Papuans; intermediate in position
between the two races, and occupying the point of junction at the Prince
of Wales Islands we find the Kowrarega tribe of blacks. At first I was
inclined to regard the last more as degraded Papuans than as improved
Australians: I am now, however, fully convinced that they afford an
example of an Australian tribe so altered by contact with the Papuan
tribes of the adjacent islands as at length to resemble the latter in
most of their physical, intellectual and moral characteristics. Thus the
Kowraregas have acquired from their island neighbours the art of
cultivating the ground, and their superior dexterity in constructing and
navigating large canoes, together with some customs--such as that of
preserving the skulls of their enemies as trophies: while they retain the
use of the spear and throwing-stick, practise certain mysterious
ceremonies connected with the initiation of boys to the rights of
manhood--supposed to be peculiar to the Australian race--and hold the
females in the same low and degraded position which they occupy
throughout Australia.

That the Kowraregas settled the Prince of Wales Islands either prior to
or nearly simultaneously, with the spreading downwards from New Guinea of
the Papuans of the islands, scarcely admits of absolute proof: but that
the former have existed as a tribe for a long period of years is shown by
the changes which I presume to have taken place in their language. While
this last unquestionably belongs to the Australian class, as clearly
indicated by Dr. Latham's analysis of the pronouns,* one of the
characteristic parts of the language, and, therefore, least liable to