"Our guides of the morning were rewarded with a sarong apiece and we purchased with rupees a pair of captive nutmeg-pigeons—somewhat uncommon pets—and a couple of grey-headed parrots (P. caniceps) that had been obtained as fledglings by the villagers.
"Once again on board we found canoes arriving with loads of coconuts and numbers of fowls. Old shoes were the principal articles demanded, but the skipper got six chickens for a white linen coat. Our estimable captain is actuated by a commercial spirit; his invariable greeting to a new arrival is 'Ah, hang sudah datang! apa hang bawa?'—'Ah, you've come! what are you bringing?'"
"March 26.—Spent an hour on shore, and then left with the breeze at 7 A.M. Sailing slowly down the coast we passed Henpoin, Pulo Kotah, and Henhóa, at all of which places are many coco palms, with one or two houses visible. Two or three miles inland a range of hills runs down the coast, and must form the eastern slope of the Galathea Valley; until their foot is reached, the country is low and level.
"Off South Point the wind became very light at midday, and subsequently we worked up and down against a strong north-westerly tide, barely maintaining our position. After a small advance, at 10 P.M. we were back again where we had been at noon, so, getting soundings of 9 fathoms, we anchored for the night."
MEN AND A BOY OF GREAT NICOBAR.
"March 27.—At daybreak the current was running S.S.W., at 2 knots. This slackened at nine o'clock, and with a light breeze from the N.E. we gradually made our way towards South Bay, until, the wind becoming more easterly, we tacked up it, and anchored towards the top in 7½ fathoms.
"The head, where the Galathea River debouches, is low and flat, but on either side the shores are a continuation of the hills, containing the river. The eastern cape is hilly and broken, but the western extremity tails off in a low stretch of flat land.
"Close to the western shore is Walker Island, a small grey block of rock that has been likened to a fort with sentries—the latter represented by columns of stone protected from detrition by boulders of harder formation, which once, of course, rested on the surface of the islet.
"Coconut trees grow all round the bay, and on the starboard hand we saw a dozen houses forming the village of Chang-ngeh, from which a canoe put off with two men. They, and two others far advanced in decrepitude, are the sole inhabitants of this portion of the island. Formerly there was on the eastern shore a village called Badói, but after some of its inhabitants had been killed by Shom Peṅ, it was deserted.