In March, 1845, Mr. Mackey, Danish Consul in Calcutta,
set on foot a small expedition to the Nicobar Archipelago. That gentleman hoped to find amongst the southern islands strata of coal, and made a voyage thither in prosecution of that object, on board the schooner Espiègle, commanded by an Englishman named Lewis, and accompanied by two Danes, Mr. Busch, the sole commander of the expedition, and a certain Mr. Lowert. By the end of May the adventurers were once more in Calcutta. With the exception of a few lumps they had not found coal-beds on any part of the island, while they lacked the physical strength requisite for founding the agricultural colony, which it had been intended to set on foot at the same time. The scientific results of this voyage are comprised in a small brochure, "H. Busch's Journal of a Cruise amongst the Nicobar Islands," (Calcutta, 1845).
A further scientific exploration of the Nicobar group was made by the naturalists attached to the Danish corvette Galatea in the course of their voyage round the world in the years 1845-7. A thorough examination of the Nicobars was one of the chief objects of the expedition set on foot under the auspices of the Danish Government. On the 25th January, 1846, at Nangkauri, Captain Steen Bille took formal possession of this group of islands in the name of H.M. the King of Denmark. Two natives, father and son, named respectively Luha and Angre, the former resident in Malacca, and the latter in Enuang, were on that occasion installed as chief magistrates; each being at the same time provided with a staff bearing the cypher of Christian VIII.,
and instructed, by means of a document drawn up in the English and Danish languages, on the subject of their duties, which consisted principally in hoisting the Danish Standard on the arrival of foreign ships in the harbour of Nangkauri.[7]
After the decease of Christian VIII., the Danish Government, in consequence of the violent political agitations of the period, did not show itself disposed to make practical use of their possession of the Nicobar Islands by any lasting colonization, but on the contrary in the year 1848 dispatched the royal corvette Valkyrien to the Archipelago, to bring away the flag and bâtons.[8]
In consequence of this, according to "Thornton's Gazetteer of India," the chiefs of the island of Kar-Nicobar hoisted the English flag, and through certain English merchants resident in Moulmein, expressed a wish to be permitted to
place themselves under the protection of the British Crown. This information, however, seems to be inaccurate, in so far as it professes to describe the conduct of the native chiefs. The inhabitants, it is true, hoist any flag given to them, because they are fond of imitating European customs, and by so doing believe they secure themselves against the pretensions of other nations; but there is nothing they so much dread as a regular occupation of the islands, and on every appearance of a war-ship are forthwith filled with alarm lest they should be about to be deprived of their liberty, and—their cocoa-nuts. Indeed they have a saying widely diffused among them, probably through the craft of some smart chiefs, that whenever a European should settle among them all the cocoa-nuts will drop from the trees, and they will thus see themselves deprived for ever of their most important means of subsistence. It is, on the contrary, more probable that the English ship captains, who trade with these islands in order the better to secure their highly profitable trade in cocoa-nuts, made some propositions to the East Indian Government to take possession of this important group, by a similar procedure as that by which the Andaman islands were annexed somewhat later.
Since the unsuccessful attempt at the end of last century to extend Austrian commerce with the Indies and the coast of Africa, by founding a few colonies in those places, no vessel sailing under the Austrian flag had again visited the Nicobar Islands, and accordingly, on the dispatch of an
Imperial ship-of-war to those waters, it was naturally wished that she should on her voyage to China visit this group, on whose shores the Austrian flag had once been unfurled as a symbol of possession. On this occasion, however, the object was rather scientific than political. It was intended, so far as the time allotted for visiting these islands and the appliances at hand admitted, to undertake inquiries as to the most important geodetical points, together with astronomical, magnetic, and meteorological observations, and at the same time to make investigations and collections of the various objects of natural science, and thus to complete as it were the valuable labours carried out in 1846 by the Danish Expedition to the Nicobar Islands. The following pages are simply limited to giving a popular narrative of our own stay on this interesting island group, while more circumstantial information of the various scientific results obtained there will be deferred till the appearance of the special works being drawn up by the members, each in his own special section.
On 25th February, at 10 A.M., the naturalists, accompanied by the officers in charge of the scientific apparatus, and the midshipmen, after very considerable difficulty, succeeded in effecting a landing on the island of Kar-Nicobar, in a bay protected by a coral reef (by observation 9° 14′ 8″ N., and 92° 44′ 46″ E.), between the villages of Moose and Sáoui. At this point the surf beats incessantly over the huge reefs of coral upon a waste of gleaming white sand, which stretches in graceful curves from one point of rock to that next adjoining.