The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-10-28
MISSIONARIES AND OTHER MEN.
PAPUAN WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY.
Messages Sent Long Distances Quickly
by SavaEes in New Guinea.


Barbarous tribes in various parts OF the
world employ signal fires at night and
| other methods for the rapid conveyance
! of information. In some respects the sys-
TEN employed among the mountains in
the interior OF British New Guinea is the
most effective yet devised.
A. Z. Pratt, the naturalist. who recently
spent two years among the natives Of this
great island, gives in his new book rather
more detailed information on this subject
| than earlier writer's have lone. More than
once he found the extraordinary system Of
intercommunication among the Papuans
| of the greatest assistance to him in his
work. He calls it the wireless telegraphy
of the wilds.
One day he needed to send a message to
a native named Gaberio. who was collecting
butterflies and birds for the expedition.
His whereabouts we're not exactly known,
but he was to the northeast somewhere.
about twenty miles away.
From the naturalist g camp could be seen
! hill after hill rising to the north, each of
them crowned by native villages. Men
with specially good voices are assigned to
the service Of passing these wireless mes
sages from hilltop to hilltop until they
reach their destination.
Mr.. Pratt set the service in motion to
find Gaberio and deliver the message TO
him. He says that after he had given the
order at his station he heard in a few min
utes the natives calling from hill to hill
In the pure air OF those attitudes their
voices carried m~agnihcently for long dis
tances and village answered village with
perfect ease from ridge to ridge.
A little later the natives who were at
tending 10 this telegraphy at Pratt's camp
came to him with the tidings that GaberiO
had been found in a village only about
ten miles away. The message was de-
livered to him and he returned word that
he was coming back by the same route
he had followed on the outward journey
and would reach camp next day.
A few months later Pratt, who was max
ing preparations to remove to other collect
ing grounds, found that he could not secure
carriers from the natives around him 70
transfer his baggage to the other field.
One day some big, strong men OF the IvaIa
tribe, with their chief, called on him and
he arranged with them that, when they
we're summoned by wireless telegraphy
they would start from their homes, twenty
miles away among the mountains, and
carry his baggage to the new camp. He
felt sure that they would respond TO his
call because he promised them tobacco
in payment, and they are very fond Of the
weed. m
Several weeks elapsed before he was
ready to move. Then he set the telegraph
in motion; one village called up another,
and so, stage by stage, the message was
communicated to the distant home Of the
picturesque mountaineers.
1t seems astonishing, but Pratt says that
this message was delivered to the chief
to whom it was sent in less han ten minutes
after 1t left his tent. The journey on foot
between these two places among the steep
mountains requires Ave days, though the
distance is only twenty miles.
In the afternoon the answer came that
the natives would be on their way the next
morning. So in due time they appeared
on the scene eager to earn their tobacco.