was Albert S. Meek. From 1894 to 1916 Meek collected, spending 1895–1901 in the Milne Bay Islands and the eastern part of the mainland. Many assistants worked for him, among them his younger brother (W. G.), Albert and George Eichhorn, brothers-in-law W. B. Barnard and Harry Barnard, and Mr. Gullivers. After Meek’s retirement, the Eichhorns continued work in this region until 1923 in this region (including Owgarra, Bragi, and Mambare River); in 1925, they would collect in New Britain, also obtaining miscellaneous insects. (Most of the bird collections of the Tring Museum were sold in 1932 to AMNH to pay debts, with the museum itself passing into the care of the BMNH in 1937 under Rothschild’s will.) For the British Museum (Natural History), A. S. Anthony was also active in the region; and very early in the twentieth century (1902–1903) the Pratts—father A. E. and one son, Henry—worked extensively at lower elevations northwest and southeast of Port Moresby and in addition visited parts of the Goilala region, following the gradually developing Sacred Heart Mission interior road (through Mafulu) to the upper Vanapa Valley (at Ononge) before finally returning. They concentrated on birds and Lepidoptera (Tring/BMNH and AMNH); and in 1906 the senior Pratt published a popular book, Two Years Among Cannibals.
Botanical collections in this period were rare, partly due to losses in transit, and, with one exception, unofficial. The Pratts in 1902–1903 (see above) had also obtained plants but a goodly part, if not all, were lost. Mary (Mrs. H. P.) Schlencker from Queensland collected extensively from 1905 into the 1920s (but mainly before World War I) in the Rigo district (Boku) and elsewhere while associated with the London Missionary Society (LMS); the majority were described or recorded by Bailey. In 1910–1911 Miles Staniforth C. Smith, director of Mines and Agriculture and long-time Administrator, with a party collected ferns and mosses on his ill-fated trip up the Kikori River to Mt Murray; unfortunately all the specimens were lost on the river descent. Afterwards Smith—perhaps soured by this experience—never again took an interest in biotic exploration, though he did support geological work (on account of mineral and petroleum exploration) and established a small museum in Port Moresby (the forerunner of the present National Museum). He also had come into prolonged conflict with Murray; only in 1918—with Smith away on war service—did the Lieutenant-Governor feel himself able to support a new botanical expedition (see below).
By this time the Victorian popular interest in natural history had subsided, as curiosity became satisfied and new leisure pursuits were taken up—although a byproduct was the rise of conservation movements. There were also changes in horticultural fashions, notably the marked decline in the cultivation under glass of tropical plants; while in the sciences, description was giving way to "higher" laboratory-based analysis, along with increasing specialization—a "linearist" development which led to considerable neglect of the Australian biota, let alone that of Papua, for several decades. The first half of the 1890s was moreover for Australia a period of severe and prolonged economic depression; recession also struck in other parts of the world. Official support for such work was thus liable to a lack of funds as well as changing interests and priorities. Only wealthy individuals (or well-founded museums or herbaria) could afford to continue extensive sponsorship and collection formation; and what was obtained tended to be the more spectacular or saleable items. The plume trade, which continued until the end of World War I, also remained an important source of new material. Thus, by 1914 birds and larger insects in southeastern Papua were comparatively well known; but, with far fewer useful points of access, this was simply not true for the interior parts of the Gulf, Delta, and Western Divisions, while botanical knowledge was very patchy and disorganized, and now well behind German New Guinea. Even today, biotic coverage of much of the southern fall of the main ranges remains thin, with more intensive sampling relatively localized.
NORTHEASTERN NEW GUINEA
AND THE BISMARCK ARCHIPELAGO
Before the Germans (to 1885)
Large-scale exploration in mainland northeastern New Guinea (from 1884–1914 styled Kaiser-Wilhelmsland) developed later than in British New Guinea or in the Vogelkop Peninsula, but during the decade from 1875 to 1885 the islands to the northeast saw rather more activity. Apart from Miklucho-Maclay (see above), prior to 1885 the sole mainland "pioneer" was F. H. Otto Finsch. This German naturalist, anthropologist, and covert agent undertook two major tours, investigating all the coasts of eastern New Guinea (and the northeastern islands)—and very likely influencing the choice of lands for future German enterprise. In 1880–1882, as part of a world cruise funded by the German Humboldt Foundation, he carried out his coastal surveys, while in 1884–1885—on behalf of the just-formed Neu-Guinea Compagnie—with the Samoa he explored in more detail the northeastern and island regions. Finsch made many natural history collections—particularly in 1881 around Astrolabe Bay, already well known from the work of Maclay—and also worked in the Milne Bay region. In 1885 he sailed fifty kilometers up the Sepik, naming the river for Empress Augusta (Kaiserin-Augusta Fluss). Later his interests turned more towards ethnography, already discernable in his book Samoafahrten (1888). His collections (Bremen, Brunswick, Leiden) were partly destroyed in World War II. The tree genus Finschia, a macadamia relative also with edible nuts, is named after him.
The northeastern island region was at the opening of the period visited by two great marine expeditions, both in 1875. The first was the Challenger (see above), returning to New Guinea waters after calls elsewhere in Malesia (and "rest and relaxation" in Hong Kong). Under G. Nares as commander, C. W. Thomson as scientific leader, and with Moseley continuing as naturalist, they worked during March in the Admiralty Islands (Nares Harbor in northwestern Manus remains so-named as a token of their presence) before sailing into other waters. The second was the German Gazelle (after which the large northeastern peninsula of New Britain was, and is still, named). With the future Bismarck Archipelago as one of the Gazelle’s main objectives, the vessel and its crew and scientists (with Freiherr G. E. G. von Schleinitz—later the first administrator of the German territories—as commander and F. C. Naumann as surgeon-naturalist), after calling in western New Guinea (see above) anchored during the third quarter of the year at several points: New Hanover, New Ireland (west coast and Carteret Harbor), New Britain (Blanche Bay—then not long known—with an ascent of the volcanic Mt Kombiu or "The Mother"), and, in the Solomons, Bougainville (collections, Berlin). In the French "grand" tradition, both expeditions gathered their results into substantial sets of volumes, those of the Gazelle appearing in five volumes in 1889–1890 although preliminary papers had appeared elsewhere, while the Challenger series was about the most extensive ever published. Both works contain significant materials of primary record for the biota of the region.
About the same time as the Gazelle came the first missionaries, traders, and explorers. In mid-August of 1875 George Brown (see also above) arrived at Port Hunter in the Duke of York Islands, there opening the first Methodist mission; he remained for almost a decade. He himself collected some plants, chiefly ferns (Melbourne), but—significantly—was accompanied from Samoa and Fiji (on the mission ship John Wesley) by a German-Australian photographer and naturalist, Carl Walter (who also was collecting for Anatole von Hügel, a wealthy Austrian traveler and naturalist). He worked for about three weeks in the islands and around Blanche Bay (plants, Melbourne and Cambridge, England, albeit with a number of losses in the field); afterwards he returned to and remained in Australia where he continued to collect for von Mueller.
In 1877–1878 G. Turner, a collector and gardener from Sydney, traveled to the northeastern archipelago—partly on behalf of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney. From Port Hunter (sometimes with Brown) he visited New Ireland, Spacious (now Wide) Bay (New Britain), and elsewhere. At Spacious Bay he discovered the majestic tree, kamarere (Eucalyptus deglupta)—always a beautiful sight in New Britain’s forests, but a seeming oddity. But this was a time of punitive expeditions, and not a lot apart from more common herbaceous plants could be obtained (Melbourne). In 1881 E. Betche—initially trained as a horticulturalist—traveled from the central Pacific through the northeastern archipelago to Australia. There his base was on Mioko, another island in the Duke of Yorks, where a German trading company had become established in the 1870s. For a week or so in July he collected there and, like his predecessors, around Blanche Bay (plants, Melbourne). Later in the year he joined the Royal
