The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-05-14
THE QUEER NICOBAREsE.


 A Colored Print From an English Paper
 Does Duty as One of Their Gods,
 I have just returned from trip in the guard boat, having been sent with twenty-five of the men of my regiment who wanted a little change of air, We went down to the Nicobars, which l think are more interesting and certain ly more primitive than the Andamans. Thirty-slX hours steaming saw us off Kutchal, one of the smaller northerly islets, where we dropped anchor about Q mile off shore and landed in boats. They seemed good deal troubled with evil spirits on Kutchal; the first thing that catches your eye is the show of devil sticks on the shore; these are thin bamboos or canes, planted in line of ten or fifteen yards apart, just at high water mark all along the front of the village; these bamboos carry large fringes of grass which are tied on at in tervals of about six or seven feet, and the top of each pole Is adorned either with little streamer of colored cloth or the wooden image of a birl. These ar engagements are found at every coast village on the Nicobars, to keep off the devils of the sea. The houses in this village are very superior places; they are built in a single line just behind the devil sticks on the edge of the dense CO., coanut jungle which covers every island except Camorta; they are octagonal, with conical roofs, and raised on piles ten or fifteen feet high as a preventive s,rr1i ir1ct yTyb iah t- pi "a m fhnSn parts. The best houses are made of wood, the less respectable of bamboo mating; all are matched with palm leaves. What gives the Nicobarese dwelling a curiously exclusive appear ance Is the fact that it has no windows, nor any visible opening as you ap- proach the door Is hole in the floor, and you enter by bamboo ladder, in- variably rickety among the piles.
 I never saw such a place for pigs pigs in the jungle, pigs on the beach, pigs roofing and grubbing under the houses, pigs everywhere; they are the finest pigs I have seen anywhere out of England, and form the wealth of the Nicobarese, such as it is. They live on the cocoanut, and it seems to agree with them. What the islanders would do without the cocoanut 1t is difficult to see, as they practically live upon that and on the cocoanut-fed bacon. Except pariahs, pigs were the only animals we saw and these run wild about the vil- lages, seeming to be public property.
 The natives were very shy, and hid themselves when they saw the boat coming off; they would not show at all until we stood on the beach, and held up black bottles; whether a bottle is recognized token of peace, amity and good will, or merely delicate sugges- ton of advantages to be expected l do not know, but after We had held up bottles, and the interpreter had called to them, negotiations were opened. The head man was the emissary; he was showed and scolded out of his house through the door in the floor, and came very unWllingly down to the beach; even then he would not speak until he had a tot of rum and cheroot. These luxuries seemed to convince him that our intentions were honorable, and he shouted to his friends, when some of the older men came down and had their fears allayed with rum. They were
  tors at Kutchal are Chinese trading junks from the Straits, and men and women wear scarcely any clothing at all. They were quite self-possessed, and seemed very cheery and contented; they reminded me of the Burmese, in the way they sat down and criticised us laughing and pointing at anything that amused them. One thing struck me; that was their lack of curiosity. | The people who did not come down to | the beach did not take the slightest mo- | tice of us; as soon as they were satiS- | fled that there was nothing to fear, they turned out of their hiding places, and went on breaking up cocOanutS and | feeding the pigs as calmly as if visits of Europeans were of every day occur renee; whereas, we were the first white visitors they had had for about two years, and I believe only the third par ty altogether who have been to the is- i land The NicOharese are certainly the uglest race I have ever seen; the phys ique of the men is good, and some of them were quite six feet high; but there was a general tendency to develop a | "cOrnOration" Their features are re- pulsive; very low foreheads. thick, straight hair, which hangs like a frings on the shoulders, and enormous teeth, black with betel nut and gunja, pro- truding so that the lips cannot meet over them. They are as different as possible from the little woolly haired Andamanase.
 They were civil and inoffensive enough, and did not mind our going into their houses. I visited several with the interpreter. The people themselves are so invariably and deplorably dirty that I hesitated about entering their dwellings, but the first thing that struck me- when I got up the ladder, was the extraordinary cleanliness of the place; the cleanliness was not pecu- liar to that one house either; they were all beautifully clean, no matter what | degree of dirt clothed the owner. Eve ry house was half filled with wooden gods, hideous things stained or dyed somehow in every color of the rainbow. | The Nicobarese do not possess paint, but they manage to achieve sufficiently awful results with the stains or dyes they use. These gods are necessary to protect the household against the devils of the jungle, and, judging from the number in each house, a pretty strong staff of gods is required to keep the land devils in order. The Nicobar