CHAPTER VII 



TRINKAT 



Beresford Channel — A Deserted Village— ///^^/ — Bird Life — Wild Cattle — 

 Scenery — Photographs — Port Registers— Tanamara — Population — Customs 

 — The Shorn Peii — The Sequel to a Death — Interior of the Houses. 



Trinkat is a low, flat island about five miles long and one 

 wide, separated from Kamorta by the narrow strait in which 

 we anchored. This is much choked with coral-reefs, on which 

 every now and then the sea breaks unexpectedly in low waves 

 which run along their edges throwing up clouds of spray. 

 Several villages, fronted by rows of streamer-decorated poles, 

 were in sight on the western shores, and further up the 

 channel a junk from Penang was anchored, the first we had 

 seen. The island is nowhere higher than 80 or 90 feet, and 

 is superficially of limestone formation — raised coral : the shores 

 are fringed with jungle and coco palms, while the latter are 

 frequent also in the patches of jungle occurring in the interior,* 

 which, however, consists mainly of open undulating grassy land. 

 We landed, after crossing the reef, near a couple of huts, 

 built of palm leaves and rough planks, that seemed deserted. 



* This may possibly be one of the results of elevation. As the island 

 grew, nuts drifted to its changing shores and took root, until, as more and 

 more land appeared, those trees which at one time stood along the edge 

 of the island would at length be situated in the interior. Kar Nicobar, 

 another low island of similar formation, also possesses forests of indigenous 

 coconuts. 



" Trinkat, being flat, is divided amongst the inhabitants of the other two 

 islands, where they have their plantations of coconuts and areca palms : these 

 last being very abundant." — Fontana, Astatic Researches, vol. iii., 1778. 



