(M61) A Dutch missionary, who spent twenty-five years among the natives of Dutch New Guinea, tells us that “in their ignorance of a living God the Papuans people earth and air, land and sea with mysterious malignant powers, which take up their abode in stones and trees or in men and cause all kinds of misfortunes, especially sickness and death.”(261) Again, speaking of the Bukaua, a tribe of German New Guinea, a German missionary writes that “the Bukaua knows himself to be surrounded by spirits (_balum_) at every step. An insight into the life and mode of thought of the natives, as the latter is expressed especially in their stories, confirms this view completely. What wonder that the fear of spirits dominates the whole existence of the Bukaua and causes him to tremble even in the hour of death? There are spirits of the beach, the water, the fields, the forests, spirits that reside in the villages and particular places, and a sort of vagabonds, who can take up their abode even in lifeless things.” Then after describing the demons of the beach, the water, and the field, the writer proceeds as follows: “Of forest spirits the number is infinite; for it is above all in the mysterious darkness, the tangled wildernesses of the virgin forest that the spirits love to dwell. They hold their meetings in what are called evil places. They are never bent on good. Especially at nightfall the native fancies he hears the voice of the spirits in the hum and chirping of the insects in the forest. They lure hunting dogs from the trail. They make wild boars rabid; in the form of snakes they make inroads into human dwellings; they drive men crazy or into fits; they play roguish tricks of all sorts.”(262)