No. 2.] BULGER — THE ANDAMAN ISLANDS. 97 



worst criminals from all parts of India. There are two 

 thriving settlements on the mainland, nearly opposite to Ross, 

 which are known respectively as Haddo and Aberdeen, and 

 several other smaller villages are being established at suitable 

 points further away. On the northern shore of the bay, is 

 Hope Town, and, overlookiog this, the sanitarium of Mount 

 Harriet. 



The scenery of the long and somewhat tortuous inlet is very 

 attractive throughout its entire distance of seven miles, but its 

 beauty is chiefly due to the presence of a rich and magnificent 

 virgin forest, which, until lately, robed every portion of the 

 visible earth in its vicinity with one living sheet of perennial 

 verdure. Now, however, this glorious jungle has begun to fall 

 rapidly before the axe and the clearing-fire, in consequence of 

 its alleged unhealthiness. 



At the southern extremity of the bay is Homfray's Ghaut, 

 and thence, a road, two miles in length, extends to Port Mouat, 

 on the western coast. The land, immediately to the north 

 of this road, is low, swampy and thickly covered with man- 

 groves, but, to the southward, a steep, sloping hill-side flanks 

 it throughout. Here are immense quantities of large and hand- 

 some ferns, backed by a grand forest of gigantic trees, whose 

 huge stems are profusely draped and adorned by parasitical and 

 epiphytical vegetation of great luxuriance. Port Mouat consists 

 literally of two bays, which are connected with one another by a 

 narrow passage only ninety yards across. The outer one is 

 open to the sea, and affords no shelter, but the other, which is 

 circular in form, has room enough within its spacious lake-like 

 expanse for the whole of the British fleet. The southern por- 

 tion is very deep, but it shoals gradually towards the northern- 

 shore, and, as the water is particularly clear, the coral bottom 

 may easily be seen, as well as thousands of splendidly coloured 

 fishes and gorgeous parterres of sea-anemones, whose vivid hues 

 rival those of the iris itself. On a narrow spit of land project- 

 ing from the northern shore and close to the little settlement, is 

 a beautiful avenue of cocoa-nut palms, growing in two rows on 

 either hand. These graceful trees, which were planted in 1866, 

 bore fruit for the first time in 1872. 



Ross Island is a somewhat bold and rather picturesque triangu- 

 lar mass of rock, consisting,according to Mr. Ball,* of bluish-grey 



* " Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal" xxxix. 232. 



