174 ANDAMAN ISLANDS AND INHABITANTS 



At the change of the monsoons stormy weather is common, 

 and the neighbourhood of the Andamans is considered to be 

 the birthplace of many of the violent cyclones that occasionally 

 visit the Indian and Burmese coasts of the Bay of Bengal. 



The hurricanes generally both originate either between 

 Ceylon or the N.W. portion of the bay, and take various 

 courses, according to the season ; but, although situated near 

 the cradle of these storms, the islands are not often traversed 

 by them. In 1864 one is recorded as having visited the locality, 

 and on the night of November ist, 1891, a violent cyclone passed 

 over Port Blair, which, after travelling north-westward across 

 the bay, did much further damage at the mouth of the Hugh 

 and on the Orissa coast. The maximum velocity of the wind 

 registered at Port Blair on the latter occasion was 1 1 1 miles. 



Concerning the geology of the islands, it is curious that in 

 the valley of the Irrawadi hot springs and other evidence of 

 volcanic action occur in the same relative position to the Arakan 

 Hills as the two islands of Narkondam and Barren Island 

 occupy in respect to the Andamans. There seems little doubt 

 that these two islands — now respectively extinct and quiescent — 

 belong to the great line of volcanic disturbance that appears 

 in Lower Burma and extends right through Sumatra and 

 Java and the further islands of the Malay Archipelago. Thus 

 it would seem that the Andamans proper, possessed of no 

 volcanoes themselves, lie just outside the line of activity, and, 

 with the Nicobars, occupy the same position with regard to 

 the volcanic track as do the chain of islands west of Sumatra. 



Possibly the land now constituting the Andamans first 

 appeared above the sea as an extension of Cape Negrais in 

 the latter part of the Tertiary epoch, at which time occurred 

 the elevation of the Arakan Yoma Hills, and later became 

 isolated by subsidence due to neighbouring volcanic action. 

 As Mr A. R. Wallace points out,* the presence of active volcanoes 

 produces subsidence of the surrounding area by the weight of 

 every fresh deposit of materials ejected either in the sea or on 

 * The Malay Archipelago, p. 9. 



