river, which falls into the channel between the
main and the island, which is called in our maps
Tantalem. The neighbouring country is said to
be tolerably productive, and was once populous;
but oppression has driven the inhabitants, of late
years, to emigrate to Prince of Wales’s Island,
and the Malay countries. From Talung to Trang
on the opposite coast, is said to be a journey of
six days’ travel by elephants.
Sungora, so called in Malay, but in Siamese
Sungkla, is the most southerly Siamese district or
province. The country is said to be poor and
unproductive. The town is situated partly on
the Continent, and partly on the opposite island
of Tantalem ; it is frequented yearly by two or
three Chinese junks, which export tin, pepper,
rice, and sapan wood. Tana is the last Siamese
station, forming the boundary between the proper
country of the Siamese and that of the Malays.
The islands on the western coast of the Gulf of
Siam are far less numerous than those on the
eastern, and the smaller ones are all uninhabited.
Proceeding southward from the head of the Gulf,
the first which is inhabited is Ko-phang-an, the
Pulo Sancori of our charts: the inhabitants consist
of a few poor Malays. Ko-samui is larger
and more populous. The greater number of the
inhabitants are Siamese; but there are also a few
Chinese of the island of Hainan, whose junks,
to the number of ten or fifteen, come yearly to
this place to obtain cotton, its principal produce,
with some esculent swallows’ nests.
The large island of Tantalem is separated from
the main by a narrow channel, which has considerable
depth of water at its south-western extremity
; but towards the north it is bare at low-
water, and even at high-water is not above two or
three feet deep. I t is greatly infested by mosquitos.
The island itself is high land to the
south, but low and marshy to the north. No
part of it is cultivated or inhabited, except that
which contains a portion of the town of Sungora,
The name Tantalem is not known either to Siam-,
ese or Malays. Possibly the word is a corruption;
of Talung-lem, or the Cape of Talung.
On the shore of the Straits of Malacca and
Bay of Bengal, the proper Siamese territory extends
from Lungu to Pak-chan, a distance of not
less th an .260 miles; including a great many islands,
some of them of very considerable size..
In general, the country is a mere wilderness, with
a few specks here and there inhabited. The best
peopled portion of this territory is the island of
Salang, called by us Ju n k Ceylon, a corruption
of the Malayan word Ujung Salang, meaning the
headland of Ceylon, which has already been described
in the J o u r n a l . The island is under a
governor, who has the title of a .Phya. Subject
to his jurisdiction, are seven districts on the Continent,
such as Ponga, Bangri, &c. extending all