APPENDIX. xlvii 



confirmation, the resolutions in favour of Captai n Low and Radhacant Deb, of which 

 tlie annexed are copies. (See note 3.) 



Although the Committee have turned their attention in general to all the subjects 

 to which the views of the Society are directed, they have more particularly directed 

 their inquiries to two subjects, the investigation of which is so much facilitated 

 by the acquisition of territory which the British Government lias made within the last 

 twenty years. The one is, the history of those descendants of the Arab tribes, who 

 profess different modifications of the Mahomedan religion, and are established along 

 the whole of the sea-coast of India ; the other, the history of the numerous nations 

 who profess different modifications of the Buddha religion, and are established in 

 the North and East of Asia, and on the island of Ceylon. 



The first of these subjects embraces the history of the descendants of those Arabs 

 who, either from a desire of trade or of propagating their religion^ have from 

 time to time, during the last ten centuries of the Christian era, formed establish- 

 ments on the eastern coast of Africa, from Babelmandel to Mozambique; on the 

 Comoro Islands ; on the north-west coast of Madagascar; on the whole west, south, 

 and east coast of the peninsula of India, from the Gulph of Cambay on one side, to 

 the mouths of the river Gauges on the other ; on the sea-coast of the whole circum- 

 ference of Ceylon ; on the Laccadive and Maldive Islands; on the north coast of Su- 

 matra, and on many other islands in the Indian seas. These people retain the 

 Arab features of their ancestors, and profess the Mahomedan religion, although they 

 have in many instances adopted the language and some of the customs of the several 

 nations amongst whom they reside. They in general are small capitalists, and carry 

 on the retail trade of the country ; they are, however, sometimes very large capitalists, 

 very extensive merchants, very great proprietors of ships, and are very actively engaged 

 in extensive commercial speculations between their respective coimtries and every 

 part of India, Persia, and Arabia. A few of them are skilful navigators; many of 

 them are the best practical sailors of all the different natives of Asia who navigate the 

 Indian seas ; and most of them have a set of maritime and commercial usages, accord- 

 ing to which, disputes between themselves relative to maritime and commercial 

 questions are decided by arbitrators of their own class and religious persuasion. 

 The Committee look for information, with respect to such of these people as inhabit 

 the sea-coast of the peninsula of India, of the island of Ceylon, and of the Laccadive 

 and Maldive Islands, from the King's and East-India Company's civil and military 

 servants who are in authority in the neighbourhood of those coasts ; and witli 

 respect to such of them as inhabit the eastern coasts of Africa,* the Comoro Islands, 



• Captain Owen, the brother of Sir Edward Owen, the present Commander-in-chief of the naval forces 

 in India, collected during the survey whicli he some time ago made of the whole of the eastern coast of 

 Africa, from Babelmandel north to Mozambique south, many very vahiable memoirs relative to the different 

 Mahomedan nations who have settlements along that coast. Captain Owen with the greatest liberality 



