"Dying Off! "
POPULATION OF PAPUA.
SAVAGE CUSTOMS IN BURIAL.
[By Electric telegraph—-Copyright 1 [Unhid Turn* Association.] (Received 9.35 a.m.) Sydney, June 26.
Mr Campbell, late Government Secretary at Papua, estimates the population- of Papua at 350,000. The previous estimate" was 750.000, which was based on the supposition ,that the interior was thickly populated. . Investigation showed that there were comparatively few there; still, there were tribes the white man had not visited, but not many. The Papuans, like other natives in the Pacific, are dying off, but not rapidly, in consequence in most eases of introduced European diseases. At llossell Island, one of the least visited portions of Papua, the savage customs in regard to burial still prevailed. When a chief died, a party from the house killed the first person they met, so that the deceased chief's spirit might have someone to bear it company to the Great Beyond.
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Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 55, 26 June 1914, Page 5
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149"Dying Off!" Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 55, 26 June 1914, Page 5
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