In eating and drinking, they go to great excess'. Their favourite food is pork, which, with them, is re markably fat, and of which they devour immense quan tities at their village feasts. They like to sit at table with Europeans; and they cat every thing that is set before them with the most voracious and indiscriminating appetite. As might be expected, they are by no means nice in the cooking of their victuals. Their pork gets nothing more than a hasty grill over a quick fire, and is swallowed by them almost raw. Their method of roast ing a fowl, is by running a wooden spit through it, and holding it over a brisk lire till all the feathers are burnt off, when it is quite prepared to their taste. They also make use of small shell fish, of which they have great plenty, and which they kill by means of lances, with wonderful dexterity. Their drink consists of cocoa nut milk, and a liquor called soura. The soura is a juice which exudes from the cocoa-nut tree, after cutting off the young sprouts or flowers, and, being allowed to fer ment, acquires an intoxicating quality. This they suck slowly through a small straw, which method of taking it, increases its power of inebriation. They are also very fond of arrack, which they obtain in presents or by bar ter. They will continue drinking bumpers of it till they are completely drunk. Besides feasting, in which they take great pleasure, their chief amusement is dancing. After eating, the young men and women, fancifully dressed with leaves, engage in this exercise ; while the old people sit around them, smoking tobacco and drink ing soura. The only musical insuument which they have on such occasions, is made of a hollow bamboo, about 2,1 feet long, and 3 incites in diameter, along the outside of which, from end to end, a single string, made of the threads of a split cane, is stretched, with a hollow groove immediately under it, to prevent it from touch ing. The instrument is played on like a guitar. It has of course but few notes. The performer, however, improves its effect by accompanying it with his voice ; and the la hole is said to be tolerably agreeable, as the dancers all the while sing tunes, which are not des titute of harmony, and to which they move in exact time.
The Carnicobarians have no notion of a God ; or rather their god is the devil, in whose existence they firmly believe, and to whom they pay a most servile worship. They have assigned hint the best habitation in the place, in the front of which they have suspended of various kinds. On the approach of a storm, or of any simitar calamity, in which they recognise the immediate agency of the evil spirit, they perform many supersti tious ceremonies, such as marching round the bounda ries of their respective villages, and fixing up at differ ent intervals small sticks split at the top. into which they inserted a piece of cocoa nut, a wisp of tobacco, and the leaf of a certain plant. It is difficult to determine whe ther these are intended to propitiate the object of their fear, or to frighten him away. It appears, however, that in every village a high pole is erected, strings of ground-rattans hanging from it, and that, in their opinion, this pole has virtue sufficient to keep him at a distance. Indeed, they seem to place much confidence
in charms of this sort; for Lord Valencia tells us, that near the shore he saw a range of small cleft sticks, with a piece of flesh stuck in each, which served as a talisman to keep off death, that had visited them most destruc tively in the form of the small-pox. ln the moral cha racter of the Carnicobarians, there are some respectable qualities, which place them far above many tribes in the same stage of society. In their intercourse with stran gers who visit them, they are at first shy and suspicious, probably from the experience or the tradition of some acts of treachery; and this suspicion they shew by ap pearing every one of them with some weapon in his hand, which he never quits for a moment ; but as soon as they see that there is no ground for jealousy, their apprehensions are easily dispelled, and they appear frank and good natured, civil and inoffensive. Their aversion to dishonesty is remarkable. Theft or robbery very seldom occurs among them ; is so rare, indeed, that a man when he goes from home never thinks of using the ordinary precautions for securing his property, hav ing no fear of any depredations being committed by his neighbour. Nor is it alleged, so far as we know, that their conduct in this respect is in any degree different in the intercourse and dealings which they have with those strangers, by whom they are frequently visited. It is to be observed, too, that their ideas of property are sufficiently strict ; for though they are very willing to impart to one another, yet each has his own personal possessions, consisting of live stock, lishing-lances, hatchets, &c. to which his right is universally acknow ledged, and which, if not with the design, at least with the happy effect of preventing disputes among his sur viving relations, are all buried in the same grave with himself. They have an uncommon disregard for any thing like ceremony or compliment. When travelling to any distant place, on business or for amusement, they will pass through many villages without speaking to a single person, unless they are charged with some special communication. If tired or hungry, they go into the first house they come to, help themselves freely to what they need, remain till they are refreshed for their jour ney, and then quietly take their departure, without ex changing a word, or taking the smallest notice of any of the family. They are united, indeed, by a mutual and constant interchange of good offices ; and neither feel, nor even show, any of that deference which cha racterises the more relipled ,stages of civilization. No authority is claimed by one over another, and no pecu liar honour is paid to any clliss of individuals, except to the old, who, merely on account of their age, are treated with a little more respect than others. We are not in formed in what light they regard the virtue a chastity. But Mr Hamilton tells us, that polygamy is not known among them ; and that they punish adultery with so much severity, as to render that crime of rare occur rence. The punishment consists in cutting oil' a piece of the foreskin proportioned to the enormity of the olFence, or to the frequency with which it has been com mitted.