62 Voyage of the Novara. 



make any one of them. As the time at our disposal for visit- 

 ing these was exhausted in consequence of this unexpected 

 difficulty, we were, very much to our regret, compelled to 

 forego the satisfaction of setting foot on either of these 

 islands, which, especially Chowra, would have presented a 

 rare opportunity of examining the effect upon tropical races 

 of men of an excess of population. That rather barren 

 island possesses, it seems, more inhabitants than it has the 

 means of subsisting, and appears to be the only spot of the 

 entire Nicobar group where the natives follow industrial 

 avocations. All manner of pottery ware comes from Chowi'a, 

 so that it would almost seem as though the lamentable spec- 

 tacle of a superabundant population had given tlie natives 

 the first impulse towards active industry. 



In the island of Teressa the Austrian Expedition had a 

 more special interest, in so far as it is by no means improbable 

 that the adventurous Bolts, who in 1778 visited the Nico- 

 bar Archipelago in the Austrian ship Joseph and Theresa^ 

 named this island, as he already had done in the case of a 

 fort on the coast of Africa, after the renowned Austrian Em- 

 press, which, corrupted by the native dialect, had been 

 gradually transformed into Teressa or Terassa. 



At sunrise on the 17th March there loomed on the horizon 

 in a S.E. direction, first the island of Meroe, than the two 

 small islands of Treis and Track, and lastly the long moun- 

 tain-chain of Little Nicobar, with the beautiful island of 

 Pulo Milu. Tlie breeze was light, and a current of a velocity 



