Of the therapeutic powers of various plants that are found in their forests, the natives have but little knowledge. All that they have ever had of drugs have been almost entirely supplied from Europe by captains of English vessels. Although they attach the most extravagant importance to the possession of these, these medicines are, if anything, more prejudicial than beneficial to them, as they of course understand nothing of their use, and often apply them in the most absurd manner. It seems that once some ship captain in order to get quit of their importunities made over to them all the articles he could most conveniently spare, such as castor-oil, Epsom salts, spirit of camphor, turpentine, peppermint, eau de Cologne, &c. &c., and ever since they pester each visitor for medicine! A native once urgently begged us to give him a little spirit of turpentine; on our asking him to what purpose he wished to apply it, he answered that he wanted to rub himself with it, and take a few drops internally, because he believed it was an excellent preservative against ague and pain in the chest!
The maladies with which the natives are most commonly afflicted, are intermittent fever, phthisis, and rheumatism. In some cases we remarked Elephantiasis Arabica (the Juzam of Arab writers), called by the Nicobarians Kelloidy, attacking the bones, and several different forms of cuticular eruption. The severity of these diseases must be ascribed less to the
insalubrity of the climate than to the unwholesome mode of existence of the natives. Can we feel surprised that naked men, who do not inhabit the more favourably situated spots ventilated by regular winds, but live on the swampy coast, in the sandy bays that are fringed with a forest belt, where they can grow their cocoa-palms with the least labour to themselves, who leave their bodies exposed now to the violence of tropical rains, now to the fiery rays of a tropical sun, and whose food consists almost exclusively of cocoa-nuts and the fruit of the pandanus,—can we wonder that they should be in an especial degree subject to disease? It is a mistake to suppose that the food of inhabitants of the tropics is that assigned by Nature herself, and therefore the most beneficial and suitable. For, despite all theory, which for residents in the tropics chiefly prescribes substances with plenty of carbon and nitrogen as the proper articles of food, we see Europeans, more especially Englishmen, in the hottest climate in the world, with a thermometer that rarely falls below 86° Fahr., devouring, just as in a more northern climate, strong soups, gigantic beef-steaks, and mutton cutlets to any extent, contemptuously turning up their noses at mere vegetable diet, and barely touching marmalade or sweetmeats; yet there they are blooming in the best of health, far better even than that of the natives. Indeed, it is a fact full of interest, and confirmed by observations carried on for years, that in the Presidency of Madras, for example, the Hindoos and Mahmudas, so widely different in their customs and mode
of life, were much more seriously attacked by fever than the Europeans resident there, in such entirely different conditions of climate than they were accustomed to. On the other hand, so far as regards sanitary measures, that portion of the aboriginal population presents the most favourable results which is most intimately allied to the Europeans, and applies in its own case the precepts of modern civilization.
So soon as the natives are attacked by fever with any severity, they rapidly succumb. However, we have never heard tell of any of that barbarous inhumanity which any medicine-man, whose treatment is unsuccessful, is said to experience at the hands of the relatives and friends of the patient, which indeed is all the more improbable as, were such really the case, considering the small advantages and scrimp fees likely to be picked up by a smart medicine-man among such an impoverished race, there would hardly be met with one Manluéna in the entire group! The head-mark of a doctor in the southern islands is his unusually long floating hair. On our inquiring of a native what qualifications were requisite in order to become a doctor, he replied with the most charming naïveté: "One must be the son of a doctor!" From this reply we may gather that in the Nicobar Islands medical skill and knowledge of the healing art are confined to certain families! We afterwards found this information confirmed, upon our discovering that the youthful Manluéna of Great Nicobar, who so severely kneaded and twisted the arm of one of the associates of the Expedition,
was the son of an aged doctor of the island of Kondul, and owed his reputation solely to the circumstance of his kindred. Besides cases of sickness, the advice, the adroitness, and the zeal of the Manluéna are held in special repute for the driving out of the evil spirit or Eewees, by which, as already mentioned, the inhabitants of the Nicobar Islands believe themselves to be incessantly surrounded.
Of idols proper, such as barbarous tribes construct and honour, and to whom they dedicate temples, they have none; nor have they any object in nature, as, for instance, a lofty tree, a huge rock or a hill, to which they attach a certain charm, like some of the Central American tribes. They have not even a word for the Divine idea in their language, nor for Godhead, nor for any Beneficent Principle or Being, and the rudely carved figures, which are found set up in all sorts of comical postures within their huts, are intended to serve no higher purpose, than to frighten away those evil spirits which even the Manluéna has been unable to see, though he sets himself forward as able to hold converse with them.
The notion of a Being, whose wisdom and whose love rule the world, is quite as foreign to their minds as the conception of a spiritual life in the future after death. We repeatedly asked one of their most intelligent leaders, who also spoke a little English, whether he believed he should ever again recognize his dead friends and relatives? But he replied invariably with a cold, indifferent, "Never, never!" All that we told them of the privileges of a believing Christian,
of a Divine Being, of the belief in a future state of existence after death, served only to fill them with astonishment, but they seemed ready enough to listen to such subjects. What little they had heard upon these truths from missionaries and ship captains, appeared however to have left them with very confused notions.
From all that came under our notice, the mode of life of these islanders is singularly uniform and indolent, its most important events consisting probably of the alterations necessary by the interchange of the seasons. They know of no other method of computing time than the change of the moon and of the monsoons. At the beginning of the wet season or S.W. monsoon, and at the corresponding period of the dry season or N.E. monsoon, there are certain festivals, which somewhat resemble the "sowing feasts" and "harvest homes" of the American aboriginal stocks. They have however no appointed day of rest, corresponding to the sabbath of the Christian Church, nor indeed do they need such, seeing that in their mode of life every day is a holiday! They have no measure for time, nor indeed for anything else: not a single native could give us any idea of his own age, nor could count above 20.[23] Time has for them not the slightest value: the watchword "Time is money!" which first given by England, is at present resounding throughout the world, falls voiceless and ineffectual on their insensible ears. Their