Papua must wait a little. An influential deputation, headed by
the Duke of Manchester, waited upon Lord Carnarvon on Thursday, urging the annexation of the eastern half of New Guinea, lest it should fall into the hands of any European Power, and with it the control of the new route between Asia and Australia discovered by Captain Moresby. Lord Carnarvon admitted the high importance of the new route, but thought that further ex- ploration was needed, and hinted that he had not quite digested Fiji yet. We cannot decree a nominal annexation. If we annex we must govern, and the government of Eastern New Guinea just now might be a serious task. It is evident, from the extra- ordinary record just published of Captain Lavrson's march across the island, where he discovered, he says, a mountain 32,000 feet high, or 3,000 feet higher than Mount Everest, that the island could not be cultivated by white men, except perhaps at high altitudes, that there are no natives to cultivate it, and that it would have to be filled with Chinese. That is an enormous work to undertake, when we have so much work on hand, while the seizure of two important points on the new Channel would be an expense without much return. No European Power of the first class is likely to seize Papua,- and within twenty years the Australian Federation will be quite too strong in her own strength to allow any second-class Power to interfere with her. Our mis- sion, no doubt, is to govern dark people justly, but tropical lands without people are sometimes burdens.
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