168 KEV. T. POWELL UN THE 



can scarcely recognise it. In regard to the question of the possible con- 

 nexion between the Polynesian and the Malagasy races, I am afraid I cannot 

 as yet quite accept Mr. Powell's theory. It seems clear that the Malagasy 

 race is not a branch of the Negrito. 



G. A. Shaw, Esq., F.Z.S. — I think there can be no doubt that the race 

 on the Island of Madagascar are connected with the Polynesians. 



The Chairman. — But°not with the Negrito race ? 



6. A. Shaw, Esq.j F.Z.S. — No ; the only questions on which philologists 

 are disagreed at present is whether the one country on the western side of 

 the island may not have had an African origin ; but as far as the remaining 

 portions of Madagascar are concerned, I have never heard two opinions. 



The Chairman. — The Hovas and the Sakalavas and the others. 



G. A. Shaw, Esq., F.Z.S. — The Sakalavas and those I have referred to. 



The Chairman. — Those I am afraid we have always been accustomed 

 to consider as belonging to the Malay race, and I think I should hardly 

 be inclined to regard the Polynesians as having been Caucasians in their 

 origin. I desire now to offer a few remarks on the subject generally. We 

 have, as all present know very well, two theories of man's origin, one 

 being that he commenced existence in a quadrumanous form as a 

 gorilla and then gradually improved, so that from the gorilla he became 

 a savage, and from the savage, first the semi-civilised and then the per- 

 fectly civilised man, until he finally merged into the condition denoted 

 by the highest type of civilisation. The other theory is that man was 

 made in the image of God, and was created a civilised being, not 

 necessarily in possession of all the arts and sciences, but civilised, in 

 the sense that he was not a savage : a savage, as was demonstrated in a 

 paper read before the members of this Institute, being, not an aboriginal but 

 a degraded man. This theory which considers the savage to be a degraded 

 man, and the civilised man to be the typical man, holds also that the Creator 

 gave to man at his origin a revelation of Himself. Those who hold this view 

 say that that revelation was not written, but that the first written revelation 

 was committed to a chosen race, whom we know as Hebrews. I will not 

 say as Jews, because the Jews were the people of Judah, and the Ten Tribes 

 were not Jews. To the Hebrews was given a written revelation, — " Unto 

 them were committed," as St. Paul tells us, " the oracles of God." That 

 primeval tradition, some conceive, must have been given to man at his first 

 origin ; and it would seem that all men possess it in some form or other, 

 although more or less corrupted ; because the tendency of the human mind, 

 in spite of the tenacity and accuracy of the memory, is to add to and com- 

 ment on that which is committed to it, and, in point of fact, to corrupt. 

 That this theory is the true one, is strongly impressed on my mind ; and, 

 •when I was reading a work of the sceptic who spoke of it as being one 

 that was held by no sane person, I immediately ascribed his remark to 

 the fact that the theory was correct. I was glad to read that complimentary 

 allusion to the theory I held as being incompatible v/ith sanity, because 

 I was convinced that the person Avho wrote that paragraph really thought 



