356 COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
from this eruption extended over a circle of more than 
2000 miles in diameter, and out of a population of 
12,000 persons who inhabited the province of Tambora 
previous to the eruption, it is said that only 26 indi¬ 
viduals survived. The mountain is now quiescent, and 
few signs of the catastrophe remain, save that the course 
of the lava-streams may be traced by the inferior height 
of the jungle now covering them. The little island of 
Setonda, which is situated a mile or two to the north¬ 
west, is a secondary crater of Tambora, and, like it, 
appears to be extinct. 
Sumbawa has its coast-line broken in two or three 
places with curious fjord-like bays, of which the most 
important is Bima. The narrow entrance, barely 400 
yards in width, and guarded by two old and ruined forts, 
opens into a spacious harbour surrounded by mountains, 
which is the only port visited by ships, and the sole 
point of contact between savagery and western civilisa¬ 
tion. The Sale Gulf is little known. Here, and about 
the island of Mayo, pirates are said still to lurk, taking 
praus and making occasional descents on the villages, so 
that the shores of the gulf are more or less deserted for 
some distance inland, where the natives live in stockaded 
towns. The land south of the gulf is very low, and not 
more than nine or ten miles broad, and the monsoon 
blowing across it from April to October as a strong 
south-easterly wind parches the entire country, so that 
the trees shed their leaves, and the ground is thick with 
a very fine, powdery dust. The difference between the 
seasons becomes more marked as we progress eastward in 
the Sunda chain, the drought being here more severe and 
the rainfall heavier than in Bali. 
The people may be divided into three groups—the 
Sumbawans proper, the Bugis and Makassar immigrants, 
