THE SEA IN THE LIFE OF THE NATIONS. 393 



Senegambia, should have developed precisely at the conduit-like 

 mouth of the Rio de Geba, opposite to which lies the Bissagos Archi- 

 pelago. Along those coasts of South America that arc almost entirely 

 bereft of islands and peninsulas the European discoverers encountered 

 nothing more advanced than rafts, with the exception of the hark 

 canoes of the Terra del Fuegans, On the other hand, near the mouth 

 of the Orinoco, at the point where the West Indies start out from the 

 mainland, the Caribs were using seaworthy vessels, steered with a 

 helm and catching the wind in cotton sails. They were dreaded pirates, 

 and had begun the conquest of the Antilles. Again, on the west side 

 of North America the coast assumes a fiord-like character at the strait 

 of Juan de Fuca, precisely the point at which the Indian tribes igno- 

 rant of seacraft meet with those possessing a high degree of marine 

 attainments. In Asia and Europe alike the acme of nautical develop- 

 ment displays itself on the most indented edges of the continents. 

 Among the Asiatic seafaring peoples from Arabia to Japan superiority 

 was achieved early by those inhabiting the vastest of tropical archi- 

 pelagos, which occupies the middle position in this chain of countries. 

 Here, among the Malays, the origin of an excellent art of shipbuild- 

 ing must be sought, as well as the starting point of the enormous 

 dispersion of the Malay race over the crowded islands of the South 

 Sea. Long before the Christian era the migration of the Malays, 

 slowly consummated, had carried to all parts of the largest of the 

 oceans one and the same type of rowboat — slender, sharp keeled, often 

 provided with bowsprits as a safeguard against capsizing, and its speed 

 increased by matting sails — a type which throughout the whole region 

 has crowded out the awkward, barrel-form dugout. In such surround- 

 ings developed the Polynesian variety of the brown race, of all 

 branches of the human kind the one most intimately and most vari- 

 ously connected with the ocean in material and in spiritual life, even 

 as pictured in poetry and m} T th. These people upon their tiny coral 

 islands, always breathing the balmy sea air, lead an amphibious life, 

 almost as upon ships riding at anchor on the high seas. They learn 

 to swim earlier than to walk; as infants they are carried upon the 

 arms of their mothers through the frothy breakers. Examining the 

 southwestern part of Asia, the Indian and Arabian peninsulas, we 

 realize that the never-ceasing alternation of the monsoons has been 

 the generous promoter of traffic on the Indian Ocean. During the 

 winter season of the northern hemisphere, the monsoon steadily drove 

 the vessels to the east coast of Africa, and in the summer the same 

 force carried them easily homeward to the Indian or Arabian ports. 

 In these regions, then, earlier than elsewhere, a profitable inter- 

 course was established across a vast ocean between two continents 

 and widely different races. Thus it came about that the Indian bride 

 was adorned with bracelets of African ivory, and the Indian art of 



