ABSTRACT
I OUR party. sailing from the North, reach first the main island of Gumasila, a tau. steep mountajn with arched lines and great cliffs, suggesting vaguely some huge Gothic monument. To the left, a heavy pyramid, the island of Domdom, recedes behind the nearer mountain as the travellers approach. The fieet now sails along the westerly shore of Gumasila, on which side the jungle, interspersed with bald patches, ascends a steep slope, ribbed with rocky ridges, and creased by valleys which run at their foot into wide bays. Only here and there can be seen triangular clearings, signs of cultivation made by the natives from the other side of the island, where the two villages are situated. At the South-West end of Gumasila, a narrow promontory runs into a fiat, low point with a sandy beach on both sides. On the North side of the point, hidden from the villages, the fleet comes to a halt, on the beach of Giyawana (called by the Trobrianders Giyasila). This is the place where all the fleets. arriving from the North, stop before approaching the villages. Here also the inhabitants of the Amphletts rest for a day, after the first false start they have made from the villages, and before they actually set off for the Trobriands. This beach, in short, is the Amphlettan counterpart of the sandbank Muwa. It was also here that I surprised the Gumasilan canoes on a full moon night, in March, 1918, after they had started to join the uvalaku expedition to Sinaketa.
