s and valleys, and rushing streams of crystal-clear water pour down
the mountain sides, and in the clefts of the hills are lonely tarns, the
undisturbed haunts of wild ducks and other water fowl. During the wet
season, which extends from June to August, the rain descends in sheets
and the mountains are sometimes covered for weeks together with so thick
a mist that all prospect is cut off at the distance of a hundred yards.
The natives are then loth to leave their huts and will spend the day
crouching over a fire. They are a shorter and sturdier race than the
tribes on the coast; the expression of their face is less frank and
agreeable, and their persons are very much dirtier. They belong to the
aboriginal Papuan stock, whereas the Yabim and Bukaua on the coast are
probably immigrants from beyond the sea, who have driven the indigenous
population back into the mountains.[430] Their staple foods are taro and
yams, which they grow in their fields. A field is cultivated for only
one year at a time; it is then allowed to lie fallow and is soon
overgrown with rank underwood. Six or eight years may elapse before it
is again cleared and brought under cultivation. Game and fish abound in
the woods and waters, and the Kai make free use of these natural
resources. They keep pigs and dogs, and eat the flesh of both. Pork is
indeed a favourite viand, figuring largely in the banquets which are
held at the circumcision festivals.[431] The people live in small
villages, each village comprising from two to six houses. The houses are
raised on piles and the walls are usually constructed of pandanus
leaves, though many natives now make them of boards. After eighteen
months or two years the houses are so rotten and tumble-down that the
village is deserted and a new one built on another site. Assembly-houses
are erected only for the circumcision ceremonies, and the bull-roarers
used on these occasions are kept in them. Husband and wife live
together, often two couples in one hut; but each family has its own side
of the house and its own fireplace. In times of insecurity the Kai used
to build their huts for safety among the spreading boughs of great
trees. A whole village, consisting of three or four huts, might thus be
quartered on a single tree. Of late years, with the peace and protection
for life introduced by German rule, these tree-houses have gone out of
fashion.[432]

[Sidenote: Observations of a German missionary on the animistic bel