NEPTUNIAN STOCK. 263 



mote times, may have been the nature of the intercourse between foreign 

 nations and Menangkabu itself, it is known that Singapura, during the 

 period noticed, was an extensively maritime and commercial state ; and 

 that, on the first arrival of the Portuguese at Malacca, Menangkabu, as an 

 emporium, embraced the largest portion of the commerce between eastern 

 and western nations. With the progress, and ultimate supremacy, of the 

 Europeans, is associated the decline and fall of the Malay states of Malacca 

 and Acheen : but long previously had the maritime and commercial 

 enterprise of the people conduced to their wide dispersion through the 

 Archipelago : yet the power and policy of their European visitors, by 

 breaking down their larger settlements, contributed to their still wider 

 diffusion ; and, consequently, to the formation of various small establish- 

 ments beyond the territorial limits subjugated by their new enemies. 

 (See Append, to Life of Sir T. S. Raffles, for much valuable information.) 

 The Malays are of moderate stature, and of a bronzed or coppery 

 complexion, with long black hair ; the vertex is round, the face oval, the 

 forehead open, the zygomatic arches somewhat prominent ; the eyes are 

 rather more distant from each other than in the European, and the outer 

 angle is more elevated ; the nose is prominent ; the mouth moderate or 

 large, the alveolar arch but slightly oblique ; the lips are thin ; the inside of 

 the mouth is violet or purple ; the beard is moderately stiff, and thin ; the 

 general contour of the body graceful, and indicative of strength. The 

 Hindoos are usually of smaller stature, and of more delicate contour, with 

 long, black, glossy hair, a rounded vertex, and somewhat oval face ; the 

 eyebrows are arched and slender, the nose prominent, and the mouth 

 201 moderate, with thin lips, and the beard thin. 



In the Malay skull, from which the represent- 

 ation (fig. 201) is taken, the forehead is narrow, and 

 laterally compressed, and the frontal sinuses are 

 well marked ; the external orbitar processes are 

 bold ; the orbits sweep downward and outward, 

 throwing out the malar bones ; the occiput is 

 prominent, whence there is an oblique ascent up 

 to the vertex, just behind the coronal suture, 

 where the cranial arch is at its greatest elevation. 



Skull of Malay. T -n rr f i_ 



It still remains to otter a few observations on 



the Polynesian Branch of the Malays, of which the New Zealanders 

 constitute an example. 



POLYNESIAN BRANCH. Lesson restricts the term, Polynesian, to the 

 islands contained in, or immediately bordering on, the Malayan Archi- 

 pelago ; applying the term, Oceanic, to the numerous groups of islands 

 with which the Pacific is studded, from New Zealand to the remote 

 Sandwich Isles. Far preferable is the application of the term, Poly- 



