Both sexes wear on their arms rings of shell work, of a kind of porcelain, which they cut in this shape by rubbing on a stone. Their arms are the bow and arrow, quiver and shield; the bow is constructed of a very light, fibrous, and elastic wood, ornamented with rings made of the rotin, which likewise, when prepared for the purpose, answers for the string. The arrows are made of a light elastic reed, and the point of wood jagged and very hard; sometimes this point is formed of the longest dorsal fin bone of a large fish, and which is prickly or barbed. The quiver is made of the bark of a tree, the shield of a black wood, very hard: they are covered with sketches in relief, executed with small shell work of a very beautiful white. These shields are long, and narrower in the middle than at both ends. Their boats are of an ingenious and singular construction; they are not less than seventy to eighty feet in length; the two ends are extremely elevated, and rise even to twenty feet above the water; the rudder is nothing but a long oar, supported on a scaffold; the hull of the boat consists of planks, which are neither jointed or nailed, but simply put together, and retained by rope, made of the rotin. To the sides are fixed two horizonal wings, which serve to support it in stormy weather. Ten men, seated sideways on these wings, by means of paddles, give incredible velocity to it; the dexterity of the rowers consists in striking the water all at the same moment, and with perfect regularity. It is, doubtless, for this reason that during the time they row they excite each other by songs, or relieve their labour by the noise of a kind of tam tam, to the sound of which their movements keep time. The sails are made of several mats, of an oblong form, and are placed crossways on the masts. The Papuans who inhabit New Guinea, and the islands on its coasts, are the immediate neighbours of the inhabitants of the Moluccas, yet have neither their manners, or possess one trait of the character of the latter: they approach nearer, and bear a closer analogy to the natives of Guinea, on the coast of Africa, and which has been the cause of the country they inhabit acquiring the name of New Guinea. They are little known, and their coasts seldom visited. They are of a robust make, and great stature, and though of a shining black, their skin is nevertheless rough and hard; their eyes are large, the nose flattened, and the mouth excessively wide; the lips, particularly the upper, very thick; the hair crisped, and of a brilliant black. The character of these savages corresponds with their exterior; they are fond of war, and to bravery they join cruelty to their enemies. In the interior of the large island of Papua, or New Guinea, there exists a race of men called Haraforas, who live in trees, to which they mount by means of a notched piece of wood, which they draw after them, by way of guarding against surprize.