“Yes, but not those very near us, I believe. At all events, I never heard any voyagers mention having seen inhabitants on the isles near which we suppose the one we are on to be.”
“What sort of people are the islanders in these seas?”
“They are various. The New Zealanders are the most advanced in civilisation. The natives of Van Diemen’s Land and Australia are some portions of them of a very degraded class—indeed, little better than the beasts of the field.”
“I have seen them,” said Ready; “and I think I can mention a people, not very numerous indeed, who are still more like the beasts of the field. I saw them once; and, at first, thought they were animals, and not human beings.”
“Indeed, Ready; where may that be?”
“In the Great Andaman Isles, at the mouth of the Bay of Bengal. I once anchored in distress in Port Cornwallis, and the morning after we anchored, we saw some black things going upon all fours under the trees that came down to the water’s edge. We got the telescope, and perceived then that they were men and women, for they stood upright.”
“Did you ever come into contact with them?”
“No, sir, I did not; but I met, at Calcutta, a soldier who had; for at one time the East India Company intended making a settlement on the island, and sent some troops there. He said that they caught two of them; that they were not more than four feet high, excessively stupid and shy; they had no houses or huts to live in, and all that they did was to pile up some bushes to keep the wind off.”
“Had they any arms?”
“Yes, sir, they had bows and arrows; but so miserably made, and so small, that they could not kill anything but very small birds.”