 While such criticism of Detzner 's adventures might have been dismissed as post @-@ bellum bellicosity , in 1929 , Detzner 's assertions came under more serious assault . Two of the German missionaries in the Finschhafen District , Christian Keyser ( also spelled Kayser or Keysser ) and Otto Thiele , claimed Detzner had not spent the war roaming the jungle , one step ahead of the Australians , but had been under the Mission 's protection the entire time . Keyser 's additional accusations were particularly specific : Detzner had appropriated his own scientific observations . Keyser 's claims carried some weight . He had published a dictionary of the Kâte language , and was a reliable expert on New Guinean dialects , and the German @-@ based creole languages that had arisen in New Guinea ; he was also a bona fide explorer and adventurer , having lived from 1899 to 1920 among the mountain peoples of the island . In 1913 , Keyser climbed the 4 @,@ 121 @-@ meter ( 13 @,@ 520 ft ) Saruwaged Massif ; over the course of his 21 years in New Guinea , he had identified hundreds of new plant and animal species , and had maintained a regular correspondence with the German Geographical Society in Berlin . Ernst Mayr , a rising star in ornithology , had heard about Detzner from Australians on a research trip to New Guinea . In Germany , during a meeting with Keyser , they discussed Detzner 's claims , and Mayr lost no time in broadcasting the discrepancy to his scientific contacts in Europe and the United States . 
