These islands, which are situated on the eastern side of the Bay of Bengal, are a continuation of the archipelago which extends from Cape Negrais to Atchein Head, stretching from Lat. 10° 32' to 13° 40° N., and from Long. 90° 6' to 92° 59' E. They are called the Great and the Little Andaman. The Great Andaman, which is the northernmost, is 140 miles in length, and only 20 in breadth. It was formerly supposed to be one island; but two straits have been discovered, which open a clear passage into the Bay of Bengal, and divide the Great Andaman into three islands. The Little Andaman, which lies 80 miles south of the Great Andaman, is 28 miles long and 17 broad. It does not afford any good harbour, though tolerably safe anchorage may be found near its shores. These islands have an extremely moist temperature. They are situated in the direct current of the south-west monsoon; and the central mountains, some of the lofty peaks of which, as Saddle Peak in the Large Andaman, rise to the height of 2400 feet, intercept the clouds, which, for about eight months in the year, pour down incessant torrents of rain on the plains below. According to a meteorological table kept by an officer resident on the island, 98 inches of water appear to have fallen in the course of seven months. On the whole, however, the temperature is milder than in Bengal, and the heat not so intolerable.

The island is totally uncultivated, and the savage inhabitants glean a miserable subsistence from the spontaneous produce of the woods, in which the researches of the Europeans have hitherto found little that is either palatable or nutritious. The principal trees are the banyan-tree, the almond-tree, the oil-tree, which grows to a great height and yields a very useful oil; the poon, the dammer, the red wood, which for furniture is little inferior to fine mahogany; the ebony, the cotton-tree, the soundry, chingmy, and beady; the Alexandrian laurel, the poplar, a tree resembling satinwood, bamboos, cutch, the melon, aloes; the iron-tree of stupendous size, whose timber almost bids defiance to the axe of the wood-cutter. There are many other trees well adapted for the construction of ships; and, as in all the equatorial forests, there are numberless creepers and rattans, which surround the stems of the trees, and are so firmly interlaced together, that the forests are impervious, except a road be previously cut through them.

The only quadrupeds seen on the island are hogs, rats, and the ichneumon; also the iguana of the lizard tribe; all which are very destructive to poultry. There are several species of snakes and scorpions, by which the labourers employed by the British in clearing away the underwood were frequently stung; but in no instance did the sting prove mortal. The patient was frequently affected with violent convulsions, which gradually yielded to the operation of opium and eau-de-luce.

Fish abound on the shores, and are caught in great numbers during the prevalence of the north-east monsoon, when the weather is mild; gray mullet, rock cod, skate, and soles, are among the best. There are, besides, various other species, such as guanas, sardines, roe-balls, sable, shad, prawns, shrimps, cray-fish, a species of whale, and sharks of an enormous size. Shell-fish are in great plenty, and oysters of an excellent quality. The shores abound in a variety of beautiful Andante shells, such as gorgonias, madreporas, murex, and cowries, with many other sorts equally beautiful.

Andelys. Birds are not numerous, and they are extremely shy. Doves, parrots, and the Indian crow, are the most common. Hawks from the neighbouring continent are sometimes seen hovering over the tops of trees; and a few aquatic birds, such as the king-fisher, a sort of curlew, and the small sea-gull, frequent the shores. Within the caverns and recesses of the rocks are found the edible birds' nests so highly prized among the Chinese, and now occasionally brought into Britain.

The whole population of the islands does not exceed 2000 or 2500, and they are probably the most uncivilised people on the face of the globe. They are far below the ordinary scale of barbarism; and in their modes of subsistence, and in their dwellings, they rise very little above the brute creation. They wear no clothes, and seem insensible to any feeling of shame from the exposure of their persons. The woods supply them with little in the way of food. They are provided with no pot or vessel that can bear the action of fire, and they cannot therefore derive much advantage from such excellent herbs as the forests may contain. The cocoa-nut, which thrives so well in the neighbouring islands, is not found in the Andamans, though the natives are extremely fond of it. The fruit of the man-grove is principally used by them. Their principal food consists of fish, in quest of a precarious meal of which they climb over the rocks, or rove along the margin of the sea, often without success during the tempestuous season; but they eagerly seize on whatever else presents itself, such as lizards, iguanas, rats, and snakes. Their diseased and emaciated figures sufficiently testify that they have no abundant or wholesome nourishment. In stature the inhabitants of the Great Andaman seldom exceed five feet; their limbs are disproportionally slender, their bellies protuberant, their shoulders high, and heads large; and, what is singular and unaccountable, they have all the characteristic marks of a degenerate race of negroes, with woolly hair, flat noses, and thick lips; their eyes are small and red, their skin of a deep sooty black, while their countenances exhibit a mixed expression of famine and ferocity. Lieutenant Alexander describes the inhabitants of Little Andaman as far from being a pany race. When he landed in a boat he counted sixteen strong and able-bodied men, many of them very vigorous.

The ingenuity of these savages is principally seen in the fabrication of a few simple weapons on which they depend for their subsistence. These are a bow from four to five feet long, with arrows of reed, headed with fish bone or wood hardened in the fire, a spear of heavy wood sharply pointed, and a shield made of bark. With these implements they shoot and spear the fish, which abound in their bays and creeks, with surprising dexterity. The settlement of these islands, with their negro inhabitants, so widely different in their appearance not only from all those of the Asiatic continent, in which the Andamans are embayed, but also from the natives of the Nicobar islands, presents a curious problem, which has never been satisfactorily explained. It is supposed, however, by Symes, that the original stock must have been settled on the island by the accidental shipwreck of some Arab slave-ship. The English made a settlement on the larger Andaman in the year 1783. Their object was to procure a commodious harbour on the east side of the Bay of Bengal, to receive and shelter ships of war during the continuance of the north-east monsoon; also to provide a place of reception for convicts sentenced to transportation from Bengal. But the settlement, proving unhealthy, was abandoned in 1796. These islands, together with the Nicobar and other smaller islands, were included by Ptolemy in the general appellation of Insulae Bona Fortuna, and were supposed by him to be inhabited by a race of anthropophagi, though there are no proofs of the modern inhabitants being addicted to cannibalism. (Symes' Embassy to Ava; Alexander's Travels from India to England, comprehending a Visit to the Burman Empire, &c.; Hamilton's Gazetteer.)