to achieve? The suggestion is too preposterous to call for serious consideration. But if for the moment we assume that the Darnley Islander instinctively arrived at the conclusion that it was possible to preserve the dead, that he would rather like to try it, and that by some mysterious inspiration the technical means of attaining this object was vouchsafed him, why, when the whole ventral surface of the body was temptingly inviting him to operate by the simplest and most direct means, did he restrict his choice to the two most difficult sites for his incision? We know why the Egyptian made the opening in the left flank and in other cases in the perineum; but is it likely the Papuan, once he had decided to cut the body, would have had such a respect for the preservation of the integrity of the front of the body as to impel him to choose a means of procedure which added greatly to the technical difficulty of the operation? We have the most positive evidence that the Papuan had no such design, for it was his usual procedure to cut the head off the trunk and pay little further attention to the latter. Myres’ contention will not stand a moment’s examination. As to the use of red-ochre, which Myres rightly claimed to be so widespread, no hint was given of the possibility that it might be so extensively practised simply because the Egyptian custom had spread far and wide. It is important to remember that the practice of painting stone statues with red-ochre (obviously to make them more life-like) was in vogue in Egypt before 3000 B.C.; and throughout the whole “heliolithic” area, wherever the conception of human beings dwelling in stones, whether carved or not, was adopted, the Egyptian practice of applying red paint also came into vogue. But it was not until more than twenty centuries later—_i.e._ when, for quite definite reasons in the XXIst Dynasty, the Egyptians conceived the idea of converting the mummy itself into a statue—that they introduced the procedure of painting the mummy (the actual body), simply because it was regarded as the statue (=78=). After Professor Myres, Dr. Haddon offered two criticisms. Firstly, the incisions in the feet and knees were not suggested by Egyptian practices, but were made for the strictly utilitarian purpose of draining the fluids from the body. I have dealt with this point already (_vide supra_). His second objection was that there were no links between Egypt and Papua to indicate that the custom had spread. The present communication is intended to dispose of that objection by demonstrating not only the route by which, but also how, the practice reached the Torres Straits after the long journey from Egypt.