816 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION F. 
From what has now been stated, it is clear that the Tahitians, 
like many others of the Polynesian race, had a very extensive 
knowledge of the Pacific. It extended from Hawaii to New 
Zealand—about 4,000 miles—and froin Mangareva or Gambier 
Tsland to near the New Hebrides, or perhaps further north-west— 
about 4,500 miles. 
When we come to consider that the whole of this vast space of 
ocean was in former times traversed by various branches of the 
Polynesian race, and that they had no leading coast lines to 
follow, but must have steered boldly out into the ocean with but 
a small extent of land as an objective, after weeks of sail, we 
cannot but acknowledge that, as bold navigators, the Polynesians 
were far before any nation of antiquity in this art. Before such 
feats as theirs, the navigation of the Pheenicians, Arabs, Chinese, 
and others, sink into insignificance.* 
No. 15.—THE OCEANIC FAMILY OF LANGUAGES. 
By the Rev. D. Macponatp, D.D. 
Read Tuesday, January 11, 1898. 
PHONOLOGY, STRUCTURE, ORIGIN. 
Tue Insular family of languages, or Oceanic, is spoken by thirty 
or forty millions of the human race, inhabiting islands in the 
Indian and Pacific Oceans and in the intermediate Malay Archi- 
pelago and Peninsula. The numberless languages, or dialects, of 
this family have all sprung from one inflected Oceanic mother- 
tongue, now lost, or existing only in these, its analytic or broken- 
down offspring. They have been divided into four groups, which 
it is convenient to recognise :—(1) The Tagalan, comprising the 
Tagala, Bisaya, Formosa, Marianne, Malagasy, &c.; (2) The 
Malayan, comprising the Malay, Java, Battak, Dayak, Bugis, 
&e.; (3) The Polynesian, comprising the Samoan, Tongan, 
Hawaiian, Maori, &c.; and (4) The Melanesian, comprising the 
Fiji, Aneityum, Tanna, Eromanga, Efate, Malikula, Santo, 
Solomon Islands, &c. Taking a general view of all, we find that 
they have a common stock of numerals, pronouns, and other 
words, of formative or word-building suffixes and prefixes, and of 
* Nore.—The chart that accompanies this paper is from De Quatrefage’s copy of Forster’s 
chart. 
