[203] Cf. Shom Peṅ spears.

[204] Banana.

[205] This same iron rod is used in the rainy season as a means for the prevention of thunder and lightning.

[206] These dances are practised by the guests from the time they receive the first intimation.

[207] Called also Kofenté—place of pollution. The natives have a horror of this spot, which nothing will induce them to visit at night.

[208] The above is the Mūs proceeding; at Lapáti there is more elaboration. The spacious square of Elpanam is thoroughly cleared, and the huts and fences of the traders dismantled, a separate place in the jungle being given them. In the centre of Elpanam an iron spike (meráhta) is fixed and covered with leaves. Then the tamiluanas, adorned with silver and garlands, arrive in procession, and suddenly pulling up the pike, throw it into the sea. After washing their feet they come back to the dances.

This ceremony is by way of augury as to the prospects for the ensuing season.

[209] Vide p. 303.

[210] The reason for these proceedings given to Captain Gardner by the natives in 1851 was, "because they do thus in England," for so several captains had told them!

[211] "Amongst the Arafuras (Aru Islands) the treatment of their dead betrays in the greatest degree their uncivilised condition, and the uncertainty which exists among them as to their future state. When a man dies all his relations assemble and destroy all the goods he may have collected during his life, even the gongs are broken to pieces and thrown away. In their villages I met with several heaps of porcelain plates and basins, the property of deceased individuals, the survivors entertaining an idea that they have no right to make use of them."—Kolff's Voyage of the Dourga, p. 166.

[212] In the matter of names, a Kar Nicobarese tries to please everyone with whom he is acquainted. There is often his own native appellation, an English one, another by which he is known to the Indian traders, and a fourth under which he does business with the Burmese!

[213] G. Hamilton, Asiatic Researches, vol. ii.

[214] This monoply is due to their geographical position. The Kar Nicobarese find it as much as they dare venture to do, to go so far as Chaura for their large canoes and pots. As it is, many lives are lost at sea. (In 1899 at least 29 were drowned in returning from this island, and more recently 12 or 13 were similarly lost.) Chaura is situated midway between Kar Nicobar and Nankauri Harbour and Kamorta, where the principal purchases are made by the Chaura people.

[215] "I was present on a certain occasion at Mūs ... having brought Tanamara with me from Nankauri. In strolling through the village we caught sight of a fine large canoe, which he recognised as having been sold by him to a certain native of Chaura. Offandi proved to be the owner, and he, on being questioned, said that he had bought it from the same man. On further enquiry it was found, that while the Chaura middleman had promised to give 25 rupees in kind to Tanamara (only part of which had yet been paid), he would not let Offandi have it till he had delivered to him a long list of articles (e.g. cloth, spoons, tobacco, etc.), which, on being totalled up, were found to amount to about 105 rupees in value."—E. H. Man.

[216] E. H. Man.

[217] "In the morning dances commenced in the open air. Two immense circles of men and women were formed, linked hand in hand, one circle within the other. The dance continued for hours, accompanied by a monotonous chant. Sometimes the two circles moved in opposite directions, or expanded to their utmost stretch and contracted again by advancing towards the centre. In posturing they kept time with the singing, all turning to right and then to left, raising their arms or letting them fall together. The inner circle knelt on the left knee, placing their heads to the ground, but still holding each other, while the outer circle, also hand-in-hand, stepped over them and became the inner one. This was frequently repeated, and in this and other movements the dance consisted. The circles consisted of about 200 people each."—"A Visit to Car Nicobar, 1851," by Captain Gardner, Singapore Review, vol. ii.

[218] Diary of Catechist V. Solomon.

[219] "It is worthy of note that this animal differs more conspicuously from its congeners than is the case with any of the other mammals." But even it—were it indigenous and not a stray introduction—one would expect to find on others of the islands (such as Kachal) similar in surface and vegetation to Great and Little Nicobar. It no doubt was established in these two last before they became disunited, as sufficient time has elapsed for a distinct variation to occur, while the far greater depth of sea between them and Kachal would indicate a separation anterior to the arrival of the species.

[220] This table and the foregoing quotations, are from the paper on the "Mammals of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands," by Mr Gerrit S. Miller, vol xxiv., Proceedings of the National Museum, U.S.A.

[221] The presence of a megapode in the Nicobars, a genus that occurs also in the Indo-Malayan region, is the most interesting feature of the islands' avifauna. Dr A. R. Wallace says, in The Distribution of Animals: "The Megapodidæ are highly characteristic of the Australian region ... only sending two species beyond its limits (M. cumingi and M. lowi in the Philippine and North-West Borneo Islands), and another in the Nicobar Islands, separated by about 1800 miles from its nearest ally in Lombok. The Philippine species offers little difficulty, for these birds are found on the smallest islands and sandbanks, and can evidently pass over a few miles of sea with ease; but the Nicobar bird is a very different case, because none of the numerous intervening islands offer a single example of the family. Instead of being a well-marked or differentiated form, as we should expect to find if its remote and isolated habitat were due to natural causes, it so nearly resembles some of the closely allied species from the Moluccas and New Guinea, that had it been found with them it would not have been thought specifically distinct. I therefore believe that it is probably an introduction by the Malays (Dr Guillemard states that this bird is often seen in captivity in Malaysia), and that, owing to the absence of enemies and general suitability of conditions, it has thriven in the islands, and has become slightly differentiated from the parent stock."

The megapode also occurs on the Cocos Islands, but not on the Andamans intervening between these and the Nicobars. This may be explained either by the fact that it may formerly have existed on the Andamans, where it has been exterminated by the carnivorous palm-civet common in that group, or that, owing to the hostility of the natives, voyagers were deterred from stopping there and thus causing the introduction of the bird, a course they would be the less persuaded to attempt in that there were no coconuts to attract them.

[222] Vide A. O. Hume, Stray Feathers, vols. ii. and iv.

[223] From A. L. Butler's "Birds of the Andamans and Nicobars," Proc. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc., vols. xii. and xiii.