Maldives: An Account of the Physical Feature Climate, History, Inhabitants, Production and Trade

The author has attempted in the present Memoir to do some justice to a people little known and less regarded. Probably but very few persons have more than a hazy notion that the Máldive group lies somewhere in Eastern seas, or would be able to fix its position at all approximately. The worse than ignorance occasionally displayed even by would be instructors is astounding. As late as 1811 a standard treatise on Geography gravely asserted that these Islands were ‘governed by a chief called Atoll’, and were inhabited by ‘some Mahomedans’! The notices regarding the Máldive Islands are so few and far between, so dispersed up and down scarce works, mostly travels, difficult of reference, that it is hoped an effort to collect and bring into one focus the scattered rays of information on the subject may serve some useful purpose. A report of the work originally published in 1883. The accompanying maps and diagram have been prepared in the Surveyor-General's Office, Colombo.