502 
VOYAGE TO THE 
CHAP. Choo are called by the natives Kirrama and Agoo-enee. Kirrama 
consists of four islands, Zammamee, Accar, Ghirooma, and Toocastchee, 
Mp-, of which all but the last are very small. Agoo-gnee consists of two 
small islands, Aghee and Homar. Both groups are peopled from and 
are subject to Loo Choo. Kirrama has four mandarins, one of the 
higher order, and three inferior ; and Agoo-gnee two of the latter. 
The islands are very scantily peopled: in Toocastchee, which is the 
largest, there are but five hundred houses. The small coral islands off 
Napa-kiang are called Tzee. 
To the northward of Loo Choo there are two islands, from which 
supplies are occasionally received; Ooshima'*, of which I have spoken 
before as being subject to Loo Choo, and Yacoo-chima, a colony of 
.Japan. Ooshima produces an abundance of rice, and as in dry seasons 
in Loo Choo this valuable grain sometimes fails, Yacoo-chima junks, 
which appear to be the great carriers to Loo Choo, go there and load. 
Yacoo-chima is said to be an island of great extent, but the chart which 
An-yah drew to show its situation was too rude for me even to con- 
jecture which of the islands belonging to Japan it might be. 
In ray narrative of Loo Choo I have made allusion to the wwks 
of several Chinese and Japanese authors f, who have written upon that 
island. As their accounts generally wear the appearance of truth, and 
as they are the only records we have of the early history of a country 
so little visited by Europeans, I shall give a sketch of them, that my 
reader may become acquainted with what is known of the history of that 
remote country, without having to search different books, only one of 
which has as yet been published in England. 
The inhabitants of Loo Choo are extremely jealous of their an- 
tiquity as a nation. They trace their descent from a male and a 
female, who were named Omo-mey-keiou, who had three sons and two 
daughters. The eldest of these boys was named Tien-sun (or the 
* Probably 0-fousliima of Supoa-Koang, situated in latitude 31 ° N. 
j- The works of these authors will be found in Lettres Edifiantes et Curieuses, tom. 
xxiii. 181 1 ; Grosier sur la Chine, tom. ii. ; M. J. Klaproth, Memoires sur la Chine; 
Ksempfer’s History of Japan, vol. i. ; P. J. B. Duhalde. For other information on Loo Choo, 
the reader is referred to the Voyages of Benyowsky, Broughton, and of H. M. ships Alceste 
and Lyra. 
