CHAPTER II

THE NICOBAR ISLANDS AND THEIR ABORIGINES

The Nicobar Islands and their Aborigines-The Islands-Coral BanksNankauri Harbour-Population-Geology-Earthquakes-Climate-Flora -History - The Shom Pen: their Derivation, Appearance, Houses, Gardens, Cooking - vessel, Domestic Animals, Manufactures, Trade, Clothing, Headmen, Position of Women, Disposition, Diseases.

THE Nicobars lie 80 miles south of the Andaman group and 110 miles from Sumatra proper, and constitute a chain of islands 160 miles long, lying in a N.N.W. W. direction, with a branch forking out from their centre N. by E. The area of the group is about 600 square miles, and it consists of some twenty islands, of which the principal are, Kar Nicobar, Batti Malv, Tilanchong, Chaura, Teressa, Bompoka, Kamorta, Trinkat, Nankauri, Kachal, Little Nicobar, and Great Nicobar.

Besides these, there are several small satellite islands: Great Nicobar possesses Kondul and Kabra; Little Nicobar, Milo and Menchal, with Treis, Trak, and Meroë further off; and lastly, near the south extremity of Tilanchong, there is the rocky islet named "Isle of Man." There are villages on Kondul and Milo, but Batti Malv and Tilanchong are uninhabited.

Two large isolated coral banks occur-one near Chaura, with only fathoms of water; and another, far more extensive, in the Sombrero Channel, with II fathoms of water above it.

Although the Nicobar Islands are scarcely ever heard of, the China Mail boats and other great ocean steamers pass almost in sight of them nearly every day, and they possess in

* After Mr E. H. Man.

the central group one of the finest harbours in the eastern seas. Nankauri Harbour has not only entrances on the east and west, that make it practicable for any sort of vessel in both monsoons, but these are further protected by the islands of Trinkat and Kachal respectively, which give sheltered anchorage outside the mouth of the harbour itself.

By any other nation than the British it would be highly valued at the present time as a coaling station, but, owing to its proximity to the Straits Settlements, and the failure of the small islands around to produce anything more valuable than coconuts, it is completely neglected by its possessors, from both commercial and strategical standpoints."

The natives of the group number at present a few short of 6000 (to which should be added a possible 300-400 Shom Pen), and there are generally some 200 foreigners resident in the north during the trading monsoon. The islands increase in size as they are passed towards the south, but the contrary is the case with regard to population, which decreases regularly, island by island, with one or two exceptions, from Kar Nicobar in the north with 3451 inhabitants, to Great Nicobar with only 87.*

"The Nicobar Islands belong to an area of elevation which can be traced from the Bay of Bengal far into the southern seas,† and is characterised by two phenomena: first, the activity of the interior of the earth, showing itself in volcanic action; and secondly, the activity of the coralline animals, disclosing

* Vide Appendix H.

"All along this great line of volcanoes are to be found more or less palpable signs of upheaval and depression of land . . .; upraised coral-rock, exactly corresponding to that now forming in adjacent seas . . .; unaltered surfaces of the elevated reefs, with great masses of coral standing up in their natural position, and hundreds of shells, so fresh-looking that it was hard to believe that they had been more than a few years out of the

water.

"The width of the volcanic belts is about 50 miles; but, for a space of 200 on each side of them, evidences of subterranean action are to be found in recently elevated coral rock or in barrier coral reefs, indicating recent submergence."-Cf. "Andamans," The Malay Archipelago, A. R. Wallace, pp. 5, 6.

GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS

203 itself in the formation of that kind of coral reefs known as fringing or coast reefs. The islands occupy a gap without volcanoes between the volcanic ranges of Sumatra, and Barren and Narkondam Islands, and the occurrence of young volcanic rock in them is improbable. They are distinctly characterised as a portion of the chain of oceanic elevation which began in former geological periods and still continues, by the upheaved coral banks, and by the continuous formation of coral reefs. The synclinals and anticlinals in the geological structure of the islands are coincident with the direction of the great geological line of elevation which connects the northern part of Sumatra with the Andamans.

Among the geological formations of the Nicobars, three are the most important:-(1) An eruptive serpentine, with gabbro formation. (2) Marine deposits, probably of a younger Tertiary age, consisting of sandstone, slates, clay marls, and plastic clay. (3) Recent coral-reef formations.

"The serpentine and gabbro formation is characteristically of an eruptive nature. The Tertiary sandstones, slates, and clay marls appear forcibly broken through; their strata is partly inclined, partly bent in flat, parallel, wave-like undulations. These rocks are accompanied by coarser and finer breccias, composed of angular fragments of these same rocks, and they can partly be regarded as friction breccias, partly as sedimentary tufas, in which beds of an argillaceous marl are interstratified. The eruption of these plutonic masses appears therefore to fall in a time when the formation of the marine deposits was partially completed, partially still in progress. They broke through on lines of fracture, of which the principal strike from S.S.E. to N.N.W. agrees with the longitudinal extension of the islands. On the middle islands the serpentine and gabbro attain their greatest development: on Tilanchong, Teressa, Bompoka, Kamorta, and Nankauri, they form bare hill ranges of 200-500 feet, and their configuration often marvellously resembles that of younger volcanic formations. The elevatory power has, however, acted most strongly on the southern islands, and has here upheaved sandstones and slates to heights of 1500-2000 feet above sea-level; on the northern islands the same power was, on the contrary, weakest.

"The clay marls of the northern and central islands (Kar