THE MAORI’S PLACE IN HISTORY. 269 
from the untwisted strips of the Rofia leaf which is now the 
national costume. 
When Europeans commenced trading directly with the 
East the population of the Malay Archipelago included 
peoples who must be classed amongst the most civilized 
oriental nations of the period, as well as savages who 
habitually went naked, and subsisted on the wild produc- 
tions of the forest within which they led a wandering 
existence. 
In the first century of the Christian era Java was colonized 
from Hindustan, and became one of the great centres of the 
Buddhist faith. The vast ruins of ecclesiastical and other 
buildings referable to this period found in various parts of 
the island show that the Javanese must have then ranked 
amongst the most civilized nations of the world. 
In Java as in Hindustan the Buddhist religion was 
displaced by Brahminism, which in its turn was partially 
swept away by the great Mahomedan inundation. T'hrough- 
out Malaya as far east as the Philippmes, Mahomedanism 
was the prevailing religion in the sixteenth century, but it 
was far trom universal. In Lombok Brahminism still held 
its place, while into parts of Borneo, Celebes, and other 
islands evidently none of the great Asiatic creeds or their 
accompanying civilizations had penetrated, the inhabitants 
even to the present day adhering to their cruder beliefs, 
their more primitive arts, and their ruder imstitutions. 
Neither in Polynesia nor Madagascar can any traces of the 
Hindoo invasion or the results that followed be discovered. 
To the rude tribes of the Asiatic islands the Malagasy and 
Polynesian people were plainly allied. In these tribes we 
find the same light-complexioned and negroid individuals, 
following the same simple arts, and having the same 
barbarous customs that prevailed throughout the Pacific 
and in the great African island when Europeans first entered 
those regions. Thus bark cloth similar to the Polynesian 
tapa was their principal clothing material; calabashes, 
bamboos and cocoa-nut shells furnished their household 
utensils. Tattooing was their most characteristic personal 
decoration. Many were head hunters and cannibals, the 
sumpitan or blowing pipe being their national weapon. 
Of the modern Malay language Ritter gives the following 
analysis :—* The Malay language comprises in every one 
hundred words: fifty Polynesian words, all answering to a 
very inferior social condition, only designating arts and 
