468 



AUSTEALASIA. 



the last Polynesian land in tlie direction of Asia. Farther east the Pacific is 

 entirely free of islands for a space of about 1,600 miles, and Juan Fernandez, 

 although in a line with Tuamotu and Easter, must be regarded as a geographical 

 dependency of the American continent. 



North of the Central Polynesian axis follow two other ranges, one comprising 

 Maiden, Caroline, and the northern chain of the Low Archipelago, the other 

 beginning north of the equator with Samarang, New York, Christmas, and 

 Fanning, often collectively named America Islands, and terminating with the 

 isolated swarm of the Marquesas, still 3,000 miles from the Californian peninsula, 

 and even 2,000 from Hawaii. 



Like other oceanic populations, the Polynesians have been brought under the 



Fig. 203.— Volcanic Islands of Eastern PoLTNESLi. 

 Scale 1 : 100,000,000. 



influence of the European missionaries and traders, and the clash of national and 

 religious interests has resulted in the official annexation of most of the archi- 

 pelagoes. England is supreme in the western parts, where Tonga and Tokelau come 

 within the political attraction of her Australian possessions. Owing to its central 

 position in the mid-Pacific Samoa forms a bone of contention between the rival 

 British, American, and Germanic powers, and to their diplomatic conflicts are due 

 the civil wars that have long raged in the archipelago. The less important 

 Phœnix, Fanning, Enderbury, Maiden, and other guano producing islands, though 

 often attributed to the United States, have hitherto remained unoccupied. But 

 Tahiti, together with the Low and Marquesas groups, are henceforth recognised 

 as belonging to France, which is thus paramount in the easternmost parts of Poly- 

 nesia. 



Geologically this region differs in no respect from Micronesia. The vol- 

 canoes", extinct in the east, are now confined to Tonga and Samoa, the former group 



