The B.O.U. Expedition, of which the present work is the official record, originated in the following manner. For many years past I had been trying to organise an exploration of the Snow Mountains, but the reported hostility of the natives in the southern part of Dutch New Guinea and the risks attending such an undertaking, rendered the chances of success too small to justify the attempt.
It was in 1907 that Mr. Walter Goodfellow, well-known as an experienced traveller and an accomplished naturalist, informed me that he believed a properly equipped expedition might meet with success, and I entered into an arrangement with him to lead a small zoological expedition to explore the Snow Mountains. It so happened, however, that by the time our arrangements had been completed in December, 1908, the members of the British Ornithologists’ Union, founded in 1858, were celebrating their Jubilee, and it seemed fitting that they should mark so memorable an occasion by undertaking some great zoological exploration. I therefore laid my scheme for exploring the Snow Mountains before the meeting, and suggested that it should be known as the Jubilee Expedition of the B.O.U., a proposal which was received with enthusiasm. A Committee was formed, consisting of Mr. F. du Cane Godman, F.R.S. (President of the B.O.U.), Dr. P. L. Sclater, F.R.S. (Editor of the Ibis), Mr. E. G. B. Meade-Waldo, Mr. W. R. Ogilvie-Grant (Secretary), and Mr. C. E. Fagan (Treasurer). At the request of the Royal Geographical Society it was decided that their interests should also be represented, and that a surveyor and an assistant-surveyor, to be selected by the Committee, should be added, the Society undertaking to contribute funds for that purpose. The expedition thus became a much larger one than had been originally contemplated and included:—
Mr. Walter Goodfellow (Leader),
Mr. Wilfred Stalker and Mr. Guy C. Shortridge (Collectors of Mammals, Birds, Reptiles, etc.),
Mr. A. F. R. Wollaston (Medical Officer to the Expedition, Entomologist, and Botanist),
Capt. C. G. Rawling, C.I.E. (Surveyor),
Dr. Eric Marshall (Assistant-Surveyor and Surgeon).
To meet the cost of keeping such an expedition in the field for at least a year it was necessary to raise a large sum of money, and this I was eventually able to do, thanks chiefly to a liberal grant from His Majesty’s Government, and to the generosity of a number of private subscribers, many of whom were members of the B.O.U. The total sum raised amounted to over £9000, and though it is impossible to give here the names of all those who contributed, I would especially mention the following:—
| S. G. Asher, | Mrs. H. A. Powell, |
| E. J. Brook, | H. C. Robinson, |
| J. Stewart Clark, | Lord Rothschild, |
| Col. Stephenson Clarke, | Hon. L. Walter Rothschild, |
| Sir Jeremiah Colman, | Hon. N. Charles Rothschild, |
| H. J. Elwes, | Baron and Baroness James A. de Rothschild, |
| F. du Cane Godman, | P. L. Sclater, |
| Sir Edward Grey, | P. K. Stothert, |
| J. H. Gurney, | Oldfield Thomas, |
| Sir William Ingram, | E. G. B. Meade-Waldo, |
| Lord Iveagh, | Rowland Ward, |
| Mrs. Charles Jenkinson, | The Proprietors of Country Life, |
| E. J. Johnstone, | The Royal Society, |
| Campbell D. Mackellar, | The Royal Geographical Society, |
| G. A. Macmillan, | The Zoological Society of London. |
The organization and equipment of this large expedition caused considerable delay and it was not until September, 1909, that the members sailed from England for the East. Meanwhile the necessary steps were taken to obtain the consent of the Netherlands Government to allow the proposed expedition to travel in Dutch New Guinea and to carry out the scheme of exploration. Not only was this permission granted, thanks to the kindly help of Sir Edward Grey and the British Minister at the Hague, but the Government of Holland showed itself animated with such readiness to assist the expedition that it supplied not only an armed guard at its own expense, but placed a gunboat at the disposal of the Committee to convey the party from Batavia to New Guinea.
On behalf of the Committee I would again take this opportunity of publicly expressing their most grateful thanks to the Netherlands Government for these and many other substantial acts of kindness, which were shown to the members of the expedition. The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company did all in their power to further the interests of the expedition, and to them the Committee is very specially indebted. To the proprietors of Country Life the thanks of the Committee are also due for the interest and sympathy they have displayed towards the expedition and for the assistance they have given in helping to raise funds to carry on the work in the field.
In various numbers of Country Life, issued between the 16th of April, 1910, and the 20th of May, 1911, a series of ten articles will be found in which I contributed a general account of New Guinea, and mentioned some of the more important discoveries made by the members of the expedition during their attempts to penetrate to the Snow Mountains.
In Appendix A to the present volume will be found a general account of the ornithological results. A detailed report will appear elsewhere, as also, it is hoped, a complete account of the zoological work done by the expedition.
As the reader will learn from Mr. Wollaston’s book, the great physical difficulties of this unexplored part of New Guinea and other unforeseen circumstances rendered the work of the B.O.U. Expedition quite exceptionally arduous; and if the results of their exploration are not all that had been hoped, it must be remembered that they did all that was humanly possible to carry out the dangerous task with which they had been entrusted. Their work has added vastly to our knowledge of this part of New Guinea, and though little collecting was done above 4000 feet, quite a number of new, and, in many cases, remarkably interesting forms were obtained.
There can be no doubt that when the higher ranges between 5000 and 10,000 feet are explored, many other novelties will be discovered and for this reason it has been thought advisable to postpone the publication of the scientific results of the B.O.U. Expedition until such time as the second expedition under Mr. Wollaston has returned in 1913.
The death of Mr. Wilfred Stalker at a very early period of the expedition was a sad misfortune and his services could ill be spared; his place was, however, very ably filled by Mr. Claude H. B. Grant, who arrived in New Guinea some six months later.
As all those who have served on committees must know, most of the work falls on one or two individuals, and I should like here to express the thanks which we owe to our Treasurer, Mr. C. E. Fagan, for the admirable way in which he has carried out his very difficult task.
W. R. OGILVIE-GRANT.
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