In the Malay Archipelago. 695 



the Papuans are more closely allied to the negroes of Africa 

 than to any other race. The resemblance both in physical and 

 mental characteristics had often struck myself, but the diffi- 

 culties in the way of accepting it as probable or possible, have 

 hitherto prevented me from giving full weight to those re- 

 semblances. Geograj^hical, zoological, and ethnological con- 

 siderations render it almost certain, that if these two races 

 ever had a common origin, it could only have been at a period 

 far more remote than any which has yet been assigned to the 

 antiquity of the human race. And even if their unity could 

 be proved, it would in no way affect my argument for the 

 close affinity of the Papuan and Polynesian races, and the 

 radical distinctness of both from the Malay. 



Polynesia is pre-eminently an area of subsidence, and its 

 great, wide-spread groups of coral-reefs mark out the position 

 of former continents and islands. The rich and varied, yet 

 strangely isolated productions of Australia and New Guinea, 

 also indicate an extensive continent where such specialized 

 forms were developed. The races of men now inhabiting 

 these countries are, therefore, most probably the descendants 

 of the races which inhabited these continents and islands. 

 This is the most simple and natural sui^position to make. 

 And if we find any signs of direct affinity between the in- 

 habitants of any other part of the world and those of Poly- 

 nesia, it by no means follows that the latter were derived 

 from the former. For as, when a Pacific continent existed, 

 the whole geography of the earth's surface would probably 

 be very different from what it now is, the present contments 

 may not then have risen above the ocean, and, when they 

 were formed at a subsequent epoch, may have derived some 

 of their inhabitants from the Polynesian area itself. It is 

 undoubtedly true that there are proofs of extensive migra- 

 tions among the Pacific islands, which have led to communi- 

 ty of language from the Sandwich grouj) to New Zealand ; 

 but there are no proofs whatever of recent migration from 

 any surrounding country to Polynesia, since there is no j^eo- 

 ple to be found elsewhere sufficiently resembling the Poly- 

 nesian race in their chief physical and mental characteristics. 



If the past history of these varied races is obscure and un- 

 certain, the future is no less so. The true Polynesians, inhab- 



