Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-08-05
Geographic News
Bulletins By the
National Geographic Society
ISLAND ALL PENINSULA

Ah AsIdHo WHICH apprOxlmateS
area OF Missouri and has d coast line
longer than that of the United
states exclusive of our Gulf States
n Alaska in Celebes. of the Dutch
East Indies" notes a bulletin from
the National Geographic Society's
Washington, d. c., headquarters.
Discussing the island as one which
has been especially inconspicuous
despite the wide attention recently
paid to South Pacific lands; and
only emerging into interest because
of the failure of a~few agitators to
, make Roadway with a Dutch Indies
"Separatist Movement" the bulletin
continues:
Long Believed an Archipelago
"Celebes has been compared to q
star fsh with one OF Its five rays
missing. The name has a plural
form because navigators long be-
lieved it to be an archipelago. 1t is
as II four Ieninsulas had been tied
together at the base. 1t would not
be playing with words to describe
Celebes as an ilsand that is all pen
insula.
New Guinea. Borneo and Suma-
ira are larger than Celebes and
more widely known. No railways
have yet been built. The vicinity
around Macassar, the chief port in
the south, and the Minahassa dis
trict in the long north peninsula
are the only considerable areas
where European sway is more than
nominal. There also are several
coastal settlements. =,
Less than half a century ago the
absolute sway of the Rajah of Goa,
in the southwestern arm, extended
within three miles of Macassar. AL
fred Russell Wallace tells how, In the
f1fties, when he was studying the
curious animal and bird life OF the
island. he called upon this Rajah
and found him enjoying his pecu-
liar form OF solitaire, a cock fight
In a shanty nea his so-called palace.
Being invited to the royal residence.
the naturalist said he found the
queen 'squatting on a rough wood
en- armchair, chewing the eyerlast-
ing sirth and betelnut while a brass
spittoon by her side and a sirih-
box in front were ready to admin
lister to her wants
"A baboon with out q tail, wild
COW whose front teeth curve back
to its ears. and a bird that breaks
it's shell and runs off to the woods,
never seeing its mother. are some
of the freakish features of Celebes.
Butterflies. some. almost transparent,
all exceedingly colorful. and cuckoos
with red and yellow bills and purple
tails are among its beauties; while
green snakes and red ants are two
of it's principal pests
How Coffee Checked Head Hunting
by demanding your morning
coffee you helped stop head hunting
amone the natives in north Celebes.
If you are depressed by too many
murders on the first page Of the pa
per propped behind your coffee cup;
be cheered by the good news that
the chiefs of Minahassa no longer
decorate their houses with skulls nor
demand that their relatives place
two newly cut off human heads
upon their graves All of which
came about because you. and many
millions more, insist upon coffee for
breakfast.
1.-The practical Dutch realized that
the kite-like northern tail of Celebes
would grow coffee. They brought
seeds and Javans to plant ii. They
offered the Celebes chiefs five per
cent OF the produce for overseeing
the native cultivation. Even a Gel
ebes head hunter apprehended the
scrupulous honesty of the Hollander,
and he recognized also the fairness
of the fixed price for what he had
to sell. The Dutch did not talk
much, it would seem, about h In
fanny of cutting off ones neighbours
head; they ~effectually appealed to
the acquisitive. instinct of the ma
tives. The method might not always
work. For the light skinned, big
cheek-boned. little people of North
ern Celebes are gentle and amena-
BILE to civilizations ways. Head
hunting with them seems to have
been an acquired social habit rather
than an instructive ferocity.
Built Houses on Poles
To-day you would not have to
climb to a post to find the home OF
a Minahassa chief, and almost lose
your balance at the first sight OF
skulls as plentiful as sea shells in
a Cape Cod parlor. Instead you
would find a neat frame house, a
courteous native somewhat incon-
gruously dressed in European
clothes which have supplanted his
ark clOtn WARDROBE, ana SnOulO
| you be asked to dinner the menu
would be something like this:
Roast wild pig Stewed fowl
Fricassee Of bats
Potatoes Rice
Claret Coffee Seer
"And the only thing on the menu
| which you might not And palatable,
bats being edible when you acquire
| the taste, would be the coffee. Sea-
| soned travellers insist that seldom ID
good coffee prepared in places where
it grows.
The hostilities of the tribes of in
terror Celebes is proof of a funda-
| mental geographical axiom-that
knowledge makes for neighborliness
Villages within a few miles of each
| other employed different languages
and the north Celebes native was lit
| tie different from his civilized broth
err in regarding a stranger as an en-
envy. While this region still is a
lingual. as well as a floral rainbow,
the common interest of coffee grow
I ing has developed a nomenclature
vubioh ic cfparalIy undarSfood