5^ 
THE NICOBAR ISLANDS. 
January I, 1803.- — At daylight we saw the southernmost of the 
Nicobar Islands, and by eleven o'clock we were within two miles of 
it. At this extremity it is little elevated. A fine beach, woody in 
many places to the edge of the water, with the tall cocoa-nut tree 
occasionally breaking the level line, was succeeded by a low range 
of hills, gradually rising from the sea, and backed by lofty moun- 
tains apparently bare. The whole composed a beautiful scene to an 
eye long accustomed to the uniformity of the sea, or the brushwood 
and sterile rocks of the Cape ; and we were regaled by a breeze 
wafting from the shore an atmosphere of fragrance, which added to 
our regret at the impracticability of landing. A canoe put oflp with 
cocoa-nuts, navigated by three men of the Malay countenance, cop- 
per-coloured, and well-shaped. They would not come on board, and 
the breeze soon carried us away. During the night we passed under 
the lee of the Great Nicobar, and early in the morning of the 2d, the 
islands ofKatchuH and Camorta were insight. From the former 
a canoe came alongside, laden with fruit, which we purchased. The 
men were ugly, and the women by no means objects of temptation. 
Both sexes were naked, except a small apron worn by the females, 
and a strip of cloth passing round the waist, and between the legs, 
of the males. As we approached the island of Teressa the soundings 
were irregular; and we found the island of Bomboka laid down 
wrong in all the charts, bearing nearly E. S. E. of the south end of 
the former, instead of N.E., as they have placed it. On the entrance 
of the passage between these two islands, are two or three rocks visi- 
ble above water. We ran along the lee of Teressa, which differed in 
appearance from the rest, in having extensive tracts on the hills free 
from wood, and covered with herbage; a circumstance which pro- 
