20 Proceeding* of the Asiatic Society. [Jan. 



Andanians oscillatory movements of tlie ground have taken 

 place similar to those known from other parts of the Bengal Bay. 

 It Mould be interesting to see whether and how far these changes 

 affected the population, the history of which we have very probably 

 to decipher from the few remains, (such as the Kj okkenmoddings) 

 which we find on the islands, for there is, I am afraid, no chance 

 of the discovery of many other kinds of Andamanese libraries ! 



Of no smaller interest will the examination of the mounds be 

 with regard to the fauna of the islands at large. Perhaps the occur- 

 rence of other larger mammalia, than the pig, may be indicated. I 

 have already stated that Oslrea crista galli and Pectunculus aurantius 

 appear to be at present rare in localities, where those species seem 

 to have been common at no distant time ; the demand for the 

 Andamanese table evidently seems to have interfered with their 

 natural increase. A complete series of the shells occurring in the 

 mounds, — some of which are, no doubt, of great antiquity, — may 

 shew similar changes, as those known from the Baltic coast, where 

 Littorina littorea and Cardium edule never reach now the size which 

 they did, when, thousands of years ago, the ancient population lived 

 upon them. 



Again, much has been written for and against the cannibal- 

 ism of the Andamanese, but direct evidence is in every case 

 wanting. They are reported as the wildest cannibals by some 

 of the oldest Arab merchants,* who had notice of them, while 

 the Nicobarese (on the Lendjebalous islands) are represented as a 

 quiet people, who approach the foreigners' ship in small canoes, and 

 are anxious to exchange ambergris and cocoa-nuts for iron. — If we 

 find in the Kj okkenmoddings human bones intermixedwiththo.se of 

 other animals, and treated in a similar manner as these, we may be 

 permitted to say that the Andamanese w T ere, atone time, or are up 

 to this date, cannibals. In the Danish Kj okkenmoddings researches 

 in this respect were unsuccessful. In fact the occurrence of human 

 bones is there of an extreme rarity, only a few skulls which are be- 

 lieved to be contemporaneous with the shell-mounds Having as yet 

 been discovered. 



* Geographic d'Aboulfc'da, &c. &c, par M. Reinaud, I, p. CDXIV. The 

 author states that the Andamanese have no canoes ; for if they had any, they 

 would eat up all the people inhabiting the neighbouring islands. 



