€0 KAK MCOBAR 



of them ran away to the jungle, where he remained, and was 

 able to support himself, until caught and brought back after a 

 three months' disappearance. 



He was a mischievous-looking boy, who found it hard to 

 refrain from grinning while his portrait was being taken, for 

 I secured his likeness as affording a marked example of the 

 features of prognathism and epicanthus as occurring among the 

 Nicobarese. 



We found the services of these boys most welcome on several 

 occasions. Frequently the surf in the bay was sufficient to 

 promise at the least a thorough wetting when leaving shore 

 for the schooner in our own boat. It was, as a rule, simple 

 enough to land, but the reverse proceeding was a less simple 

 matter. In such a case, we used one of the native canoes and 

 a crew of mission lads. 



After loading the light hull with our impedimenta, it was 

 an easy business to place it at the water's edge, and, at a 

 suitable opportunity, run it out into waist-deep water, jump on 

 the almost uncapsizable hull, and with quickly-grasped paddles 

 — no troublesome operation of shipping lengthy oars in row- 

 locks — force the slender craft beyond the breakers. Arrived 

 at the schooner, a biscuit apiece seemed to be considered ample 

 reward by our young friends (biscuits, stale bread, and old 

 crusts are in great request among the Nicobarese), who, after 

 disposing of them, would return to their canoe and disappear 

 into the darkness with cheery farewell cries: " Good-Jiight ; good- 

 night, sar ; go-o-od-mght." 



Early in our visit, we one morning met with a mishap when 

 landing in our stumpy dinghy through some more than usually 

 heavy surf The surroundings were scarcely such as one 

 would connect our late Laureate with, but at the moment of 

 catastrophe, some lines of his flashed into my mind : 



"'Courage,' he said, and pointed to the land, 

 ' This mounting wave will roll us shoreward soon,' " 



and indeed it did. A big breaker rose under the stern, and 



