PLACE NAMES 155 the export trade in their hands, only give the Shom Pen one packet for six bundles! The bush aborigines have no settled dwelling-places, but wander about, although they have good gardens established in various localities. Their language is quite distinct from the Nicobarese,* but each knows enough of the others' speech to make themselves mutually understood. Asked, however, whether further south we could get a man who knew the Shom Pen language, Domeat replied: "When one of us sees a Shom Pen he runs away, and when a Shom Pen sees a Nicobar man he spears him!"+ Misunderstandings frequently occurred when we talked to him about the various places on the coast. The name given on the chart is often not known to the natives: the Chinese have another name, which is not given on the chart, and the natives have a third, but are generally familiar with that used by the traders. I believe the following to be correct : - Native Name. Kópenhéat. Kassandun. Koé. Kánal. Henhóa. Chang-ngeh. Shom Pen. allai. noité. +"The coast natives, man for man, are superior to the Shom Pen, and regard themselves so both physically and mentally. I have known of a lot of the latter (estimated at about 20) attacking a coast hut in which there were only two men. On these showing resistance and wounding a couple of the Shom Pen with wooden spears, thrown from inside the hut, the latter fled, carrying away We arrived off the village at II A.M., and worked in to an anchorage against a land breeze. The junks in whose company we had been at Kondul were already in the harbour-a square indentation, fringed with coral. With a look-out at the mast-head we got in without accident, and anchored in a fairly sheltered position, but some distance outside the other vessels. Small streams debouch in either corner of the bay; but the village, which consists of a dozen or more houses, and is the largest on the west coast, lies to the south of the harbour, with the usual accompaniment of numerous coco palms. As a heavy surf was breaking on the reef fronting the houses, we rowed up the bay and landed by a small hut, beside which was a well of good water, and from thence reached the village by a path leading through scrub and many screw-pines. Interviewing the headman, we learnt that a Shom Pen settlement lay half a day's journey in the interior, and having arranged with Nyam (the headman) to guide us on the morrow, we set out, accompanied by his brother Puchree, on a stroll through the village. This really consists of two settlements-that nearest the bay, Pulo Rotan or Koé, and the other to the south, which at high tide is cut off from the mainland by a marshy channel-Pulo Bábi or Kanal. There are more houses, both round and square, than appear from seawards, but several are uninhabited and falling to pieces. Graves, placed between the houses, were marked by peeled sticks and young saplings, on which a foot or so of the branches had been left. The land on which the village stood was of very recent formation, consisting entirely of sand, coral blocks, and débris of the roughest kind. It would seem that the Nicobars are not only an area of elevation (as shown in Kar Nicobar, Trinkat, etc.), but also one of growth, as appears to be the case in the islands where there the two wounded men. I have never heard of Shom Peň venturing to attack the coast people unless they were in superior numbers and could take them by surprise," writes Mr E. H. Man, however. is a central mountain mass with radiating arms and shore plains; in these the central high land was first elevated, and formed a core for the extension of land by the agency of fringing reefs where the surrounding sea-bottom has only a slight inclination. Of this latter phenomenon Pulo Bábi appears to be an example, since, for some distance inland the shore is flat, and composed of coral sand and debris, with a substratum of freshlooking coral rock. The bay is becoming choked with coral, and between living reef and shore are broad belts of slimy mud, a little lower than some of the coral heads beyond, where the reef, having reached low-water level, has stopped in its growth and died. Meanwhile it is extending outward on its own talus, and at the same time débris and sand are cast continually shoreward, and, with the help of smaller coralline growths, fill up the interstices of the shore coral until a solid bank is formed, which, by further aid from the waves of the sea, and from the land and its vegetation, is raised above high water and in time becomes dry land. Such action depends on the tides, slope of the sea-bottom, and the relation of one part of the shore to another in regard to contour and position, but particularly on the currents, which in some places would accumulate material and in others remove it. The crowns of the palm trees were frequented by flocks of the black and white nutmeg - pigeon (Carpophaga bicolor), an uncommon bird in such a situation. Of those we shot, several lodged in the trees and were fetched down by the natives, who climbed with the ankles joined by a belt or piece of rattan, and who, when lifting the feet, did not clasp the trunk with the arms as we should, but placing one round it, pressed against it with the other hand. We found two Shom Pen youths in the village, who seemed to be in a state of easy servitude, and were used for such work as carrying nuts or fetching water. There were between twenty and thirty men and boys dwelling here, and the skipper (with whom the people were more communicative than with us) said, only four women! Although, by going to Naukauri Harbour, said Puchree, they could obtain wives,-who, however, refused to leave their own. homes, he lamented the almost total impotence of himself and neighbours in the way of offspring. Asked if they ever married Shom Pen women, he said, " No, they didn't like them; they were dirty and didn't wash"; and when we suggested that he should catch (tangkap) a young one, and first train her for a year or two, and teach her manners-"Too much trouble." “March 25.—We met Nyam and a companion at his house about six o'clock, and after a walk of half a mile reached the bank of a little river some 30 feet wide. Here lay a canoe, and paddles being produced we travelled up-stream, wading now and again over the shallows, until, having progressed a mile or so, we landed on the same bank at a spot where a second path commenced. This we followed for 2 miles in a northerly direction, crossing by the way the stream itself and a little tributary by bridges of sapling, and so arrived at the Shom Pen village. "We had already seen two kinds of buildings amongst these people; here we met with a third. "The houses-five in number, and recently constructed-stood on piles about 12 feet high; in several cases a live tree being built in. These supports were strengthened by diagonal struts— a most uncommon form of scaffolding among savages. The floors were made of saplings placed side by side, and the side walls, about 3 feet high, of split nibong palm; while the roofs, which just afforded head-room at the apex, were roughly thatched with whole palm leaves, piled on butt downwards. "Each house was about 8 feet square, and at one end of each a small platform was attached, on which was the fireplace, with cooking apparatus of bark sheets covered with large green leaves, to prevent charring. In a corner of each hut was a shelf of split sticks, and a long trough of split and hollowed palm trunk sloped from ground to floor for the dogs and other animals to mount by. The ladders for human use were |