Page:Scented isles and coral gardens- Torres Straits, German New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies, by C.D. Mackellar, 1912.pdf/100

70 in Sydney for her collection, and who used nightly to show me her new purchases, wondered if there were any in New Guinea—would I remember it? A distinguished clansman, who was a Member of the Government, thought I ought not to do such a risky thing. I was not strong enough to face those terrible malarial fevers—they struck you suddenly, and you were dead perhaps in a few hours. What pretty tales I was told. Miss Lottie Collins of Tarrara-boom-de-ay fame said, "Going to New Guinea—really?—where's that?" and thought Sydney "a lovely place." So I took my passage via German New Guinea to Singapore.

Sydney was in a fever of preparation for the approaching visit of their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York and the Federation fêtes, doing some needful cleaning up and otherwise much occupied, and did not shed a single tear when I left her shores on a lovely day, perhaps to grace the dinner-table or sideboard of some New Guinea chief.

Es war ein schöner Sonntag Morgen, anyway a beautiful morning, when I boarded the Stettin, surveyed my white cabin, and found it, after all, not so bad. It had a hanging cupboard and drawers to bestow my belongings in. Then suddenly the door opened and in walked the skipper, Captain Niedermayer, shook hands and welcomed me on board, offering to do all that he could for my comfort in every way (and was as good as his word always).

We steamed away down Sydney's famous harbour, and there were great jokes made as we passed the obsolete fort, for, shortly before this, Sydney woke one morning to see the Boer Flag floating from that fort! Who put it there?—was there no one to guard that fort?