As the steamer carried this scouting party against the swift current up the river toward Iala, Tamate wanted to find how far up the river the village lay.  So he beckoned Iko to him.  Tamate did not know a word of the dialect which Iko spoke, but he had with him an old wrinkled Papuan, who knew Iko’s language, and who looked out with worshipping eyes at the great white man who was his friend.  So Tamate, wishing to ask Iko how far away the village of Iala was, spoke first to old Vaaburi,[40] and then Vaaburi asked Iko.

Iko stretched out his dark forefinger, and made them understand that that finger meant the length of their journey to Iala.  Then with his other hand he touched his forefinger under the second joint to show how far they had travelled on their journey—­not a third of the distance.

Hour after hour went by, as the steamer drove her way through the swiftly running waters of Aivai.  And ever Iko pointed further and further up his finger until at last they had reached his claw-like nail.  By three o’clock the middle of the nail was reached.  The eyes of all looked anxiously ahead.  At every curve of the river they strained their sight to see if Iala were in view.  How would these savage people welcome the white men and woman in their snorting great canoe that had no paddles, nor oars?  There came a sharp bend in the river, and then a long straight reach of water lying between the forest-covered banks.  Suddenly Iko called out, and Tamate and Mr. and Mrs. Abel peered ahead.

The great trees of the river nearly met above their heads, and only a narrow strip of sky could be seen.

There in the distance were the houses of Iala, close clustered on both banks of the steaming river.  They stood on piles of wood driven into the mud, like houses on stilts, and their high-pointed bamboo roofs stood out over the river like gigantic poke-bonnets.

“Slow,” shouted Tamate to the engineer.  The Miro slackened speed till she just stemmed the running current and no more.

“It will be a bit of a shock to them,” said Tamate to his friends, “to see this launch.  We will give them time to get their wits together again.”

Looking ahead through their glasses, the white men and Mrs. Abel could see canoes swiftly crossing and re-crossing the river and men rushing about.

“Full speed ahead,” cried Tamate again, and then after a few revolutions of the engine, “Go slow.  It will never do,” he said, “to drop amongst them while they are in that state.  They will settle down presently.”  And then, as he looked up at the sky between the waving branches of the giant trees, “we have got a good two hours’ daylight yet,” he said.