Adventure Magazine Cover — page 89: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

One Lone White Man hold out for long. There ought to be some way to stop this war—or—something.” ‘“‘What of the Little People?’’ murmured Maru suggestively. The trader shook his head. ‘“‘They are friends to no one, and I doubt whether they would go to war for my sake. They have never gone fighting this side of the ravine.” There was a long silence as the white man and the brown pondered the problem of how — to keep alive in the midst of ten thousand warriors who were hostile and religiously believed that a smoked head was the highest prize possible for a brave man to obtain. ee THE Little People were one of those Pn mysteries that ethnologists some- 2633 times run up against. They were not of the islanders, they were strictly not of the Pacific Islands at all. Their nearest relatives, froma cranial standpoint, and the standpoint of culture, were the Australian bushmen. They were not over five feet in height, were phallic worshipers, used poi- soned weapons, and were reputed to be cannibals. They were fierce and warlike when attacked, but never by any chance entered into wars of aggression or extension. They hated the ordinary islander and were in turn feared and hated. It is possi- ble that they had drifted into New Ireland in those far-off days when Australasia was one vast continent, before the great cata- clysm came and split the land masses into isolated islands. The country of the Little People was rather curiously situated. A narrow inlet of the sea ran inland for nearly six miles, and then turned and ran parallel with the coast for nearly two miles, before narrowing into a deep ravine that ran out into a huge man- grove and sago swamp, extending to the very mountains that fringed the coast fur- ther on. Shut in on one side by the sea and a rocky coast, on another by the ravine, and another, by the more or less impassable swamp, the Little People retained-their original charac- teristics and took no part in the general life of the island. They rarely ventured outside of their domains, and only did so when in need of meat, which was rather scarce ijn their own country. Their usual way of exit was by a fragile bridge that spanned the ane just where it changed from the sea inlet. The bridge was skilfully woven of jungle lianas, strengthened with wood, and with a liana hand-rail for the nervous. On both sides of the ravine, where the bridge ran, the jungle sloped away to the beach and the sea on one side, and on the other to a rich hilly valley that ran for some miles until it reached the foothills of the distant moun- tains. BRIDGE, Coco-niut 4 . creat ha ie Bla VILLAGES F War ree 6 & a LE TRADERS VALLEY On the rare occasions the Little People did cross the ravine into the valley, they hunted in parties of three or four and interfered with none, unless they were first interfered with. Occasionally some young bucks of the island- ers would endeavor to capture a head, and they would usually be found soon after their attempt strangely swollen and distorted, while the Little People would have vanished back across their fragile bridge. None of the valley people had ever crossed that bridge. It was said that long before, and at various periods, three great kings had led forces into the Little People’s country. They never came back. Nothing was ever heard of them again. The only unusual thing noticed was the smoke of many cook- ing-fires above the tree-tops across the ravine. Once the trader had found one of the Little People caught in a wild-pig trap and had set him free and doctored his ragged wounds. The native had become separated MICLOOOKS 83 (C@