In their manner of feeding they show a perpetual craving for change, the most fruitful tree not detaining them for many moments; while for each fruit from which a single bite is taken, half a dozen are plucked and thrown down.
Crabs swarmed nearly everywhere: scarlet hermits, that dragged about their variously-shaped domiciles in which they shut themselves up and lay inert when disturbed; and the hideous, purplish land-crabs, that scrambled away waving threatening claws at sight of a stranger. So numerous and rapacious were all these, that a week's assiduous trapping for mammals only produced one specimen, since the baits were always immediately discovered and devoured by the unwelcome and valueless crustacean.
Before we left, a number of men from Great Nicobar arrived in a large canoe: they were proceeding to Nankauri on one of the expeditions undertaken by the Nicobarese when they desire to obtain the pottery manufactured only by the women of Chaura.
We weighed anchor at sunrise on March 4th, having added a pitta, an owl, and the Rhinomyias—all new species—to the avifauna of the islands during a most satisfactory visit of seven days.
CHAPTER XII
KONDUL AND GREAT NICOBAR
The Anchorage—The Island—Villages—We leave Kondul—Great Nicobar—Anchorage—Collecting—Up the Creek—A Bat Camp—Young Bats—Traces of the Shom Peṅ—Bird Life—Fish—Ganges Harbour—Land Subsidence—Tupais—We Explore the Harbour—A Jungle Pig—"Jubilee" River—Chinese Navigation—Rainy Weather—Kondul Boys—Coconuts—Chinese Rowing.
On the same day, we anchored as night fell, close to the island of Kondul, having sailed down the west side of Little Nicobar—a coast of sand-beaches and steep jungle-covered hills—and crossed the St George's Channel, which divides the latter island from Great Nicobar.