NO. II MELANESIANS AND AUSTRALIANS HRDLICKA 23 



discussion of the whole subject. It presents no new facts. The author 

 marshalls succinctly all the hitherto given physical, as well as certain 

 cultural and linguistic items of evidence that apparently favor the 

 theory of ancient Melanesian- Australian influx to the American con- 

 tinent, as well as some of the objections, and concludes: 



There are now certain proofs that four elements have entered into the 

 formation of the American people : 



An Australian element ; 



An element attached linguistically to the Malayo-Polynesian and by its physical 

 characteristics to the Melanesian group; 



An Asiatic element, doubtless the most important, which gave the people of the 

 New World in general a certain uniformity of external aspect; and 



An Uralian element, represented by the Eskimo. 



The order of the coming of these different elements seems to have been that 

 in which they are here enumerated.^" 



In 1926 the problem of Australoid immigration into South America 

 is dealt with by Correa (1926 a). The Wegener hypothesis of move- 

 ments of the continents leads Correa to the belief that South America 

 at one time had a land connection with Australia through the inter- 

 mediary of the since displaced and severed Antarctica, and that man 

 from Australia and Tasmania reached America over the land and over 

 the small straits, canals, and islands that marked the former con- 

 tinuity of the continental masses.^' 



In 1926, too, Correa presents his views more amply and explicitly 

 at the XXII International Congress of Americanists in Rome. He 

 offers no original observations, but combats the view of the basic 

 unity of the American race and formulates thus his conclusions : 



Anthropological, ethnographical, and linguistic analysis permits us to believe 

 that the genesis of the pre-Columbian populations of America involves the 

 intervention of divers ethnic strata. It is possible to distinguish, dispersed among 



*^ " En resume, on a maintenant des preuves certaines que quatre elements 

 sont intervenus dans la formation du peuple americain : 



" Un element australien; 



" Un element de parler malayo-polynesien se rattachant par ses caracteres 

 physiques au groupe melanesien; 



" Un element asiatique, sans doute de beaucoup le plus important, qui a impose 

 a I'ensemble des habitants du Nouveau-Monde une certaine uniformite d' aspect 

 exterieur ; 



" Un element ouralien, represente par les Eskimo. 



"II semble que I'ordre d'arrivee de ces divers elements soit celui dans lequel 

 je viens de les enumerer." (P. 311.) 



°° . . . . ficava " a possibilidade da passagem do Homen, que transporia mais 

 facilmente pequenos estreitos e canais e aproveitaria istmos, peninsulas e ilhas 

 que marcavam, como ainda hoje algumas o fazem, a anterior continuidade dessas 

 massas continentais." (P. 229.) 



