THE NICOBAR ISLANDS. 
T( 3 
from the natives, population is certainly on its decline, and 
should Christian civilization not to come to the help of those 
wretched savages, the time is probably not distant, when they 
will have disappeared entirely, as so mat y wild tribes have 
done in different parts of the world. 
The Nicobarians do not possess the slightest knowledge of 
a Supreme Being, they have no religious worship whatever, 
unless we give such a name to the superstitious ideas they en¬ 
tertain concerning the souls of the dead. They dread much 
the souls of wicked people, because they believe that after 
their demise, or the separation from their earthly abode, those 
souls retain their former malicious propensities, and endeavor 
to annoy the living. The Nicobarians believe that they can 
propitiate those evil spirits by making to them some offerings. 
It is customary among them to make great rejoicings on the 
occasion of the funeral of old people. The defunct, previous¬ 
ly to his departure from this world, fattens a number of 
pigs and fowls, which are to be eaten on the occasion of his 
funeral. Next to this, in point of folly, the parents invariably 
bury with the corpse all the small property belonging to the 
deceased, such as clothes, or rather rags, silver, knife, &e. 
This is the reason why the silver they get in exchange for 
their cocoanuts, or which they rob from vessels which happen 
to fall a prey to their rapacity, disappears almost completely, 
without affording them any profit. 
The Nicobarians hold in dishonor simultaneous polygamy, 
but do not scruple at all about successive polygamy; that 
is to say, they never keep more than one wife at once, but 
they are easy in dismissing her for the slightest motive, and 
taking another. The dismissed wife is not considered as dis¬ 
honored, but can easily find another husband. This is perhaps 
the principal reason of the comparative sterility of those 
women, notwithstanding their being of a corpulent and stout 
complexion. The females are universally far from being fair, 
and indeed they are probably the ugliest in the world; they 
shave their heads in order to add, as one would believe, to 
tbeir natural ugliness and deformity. 
The chief productions of the country are the cocoanut and the 
betelnut. The cocoanut tree grows on the flat ground, chiefly 
along the shores and in the valleys. The nut is not of a large 
kind, but filled with a thick pulp which yields more oil than 
the nut of a longer kind. The yams of Nicobar are probably 
the finest in India, both in size and quality. Oranges are very 
abundant and remarkably sweet. Various sorts of plantains 
are to be found, I had taken with me some seeds of different 
kinds of vegetables, they grew remarkably well, and their 
