The Papuans, as a rule, do not torture their prisoners for the
mere idea of torture, though they have often been known to roast a
man alive, for the reason that the meat is supposed to taste better
thus. This they also do to pigs, and I myself, on this very expedition,
caught some of our carriers making preparations to roast a pig alive,
and just stopped them in time. For this reason Monckton would always
shoot the pigs brought in for his carriers, but in this case one pig
was overlooked. I have heard of cases of white men having been roasted
alive, one case being that of the two miners, Campion and King. But
we had learnt that this Dobodura tribe had a system of torture that
was brutal beyond words. In the first place they always try to wound
slightly and capture a man alive, so that they can have fresh meat
for many days. They keep their prisoner tied up alive in the house and
cut out pieces of his flesh just when they want it, and we were told,
incredible as it seems, that they sometimes manage to keep him alive
for a week or more, and have some preparation which prevents him from
bleeding to death.
Monckton advised both Acland and myself to shoot ourselves with
our revolvers if we saw that we were overwhelmed, so as to escape
these terrible tortures, and he assured us that he should keep the
last bullet in his own revolver for himself.
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