GROWTH AND DECLINE OF CULTURE. 169 



It seems from tlie appearance of this remarkable apparatus 

 in Madagascar and in the Eastern Archipelago, that the art of 

 iron-smelting in these distant districts has had a common origin. 

 Very likely the art may have gone from Sumatra or Java to 

 Madagascar, but if so, this must have happened when they were 

 in the Iron Age, to which we have no reason to suppose they 

 had come in the time of their connexion with the ironless Maoris 

 and Tahitians. Language throws no light on the matter; iron 

 is called in Malay, bdsi, and in Malagasy, vi. 



It is but seldom that the transmission of an art to distant 

 regions can be traced, except among comparatively high races, 

 by such a beautiful piece of evidence as this. The state of 

 things among the lower tribes which presents itself to the stu- 

 dent, is a substantial similarity in knowledge, arts, and cus- 

 toms, running through the whole world. Not that the whole 

 culture of all tribes is alike, — far from it ; but if any art or cus- 

 tom belonging to a low tribe is selected at random, it is twenty 

 to one that something substantially like it may be found in at 

 least one place thousands of miles off, though it very frequently 

 happens that there are large portions of the earth's surface 

 lying between, where it has not been observed. Indeed, there 

 are few things in cookery, clothing, arms, vessels, boats, orna- 

 ments, found in one place, that cannot be matched more or less 

 nearly somewhere else, unless we go into small details, or rise 

 to the level of the Peruvians and Mexicans, or at least of the 

 highest South Sea Islanders. A few illustrations may serve to 

 give an idea of the kind of similarity which prevails so largely 

 among the simpler arts of mankind. 



The most rudimentary bird-trap is that in which the hunter is 

 his own trap, as in Australia, where ColHns thus describes it : — 

 " A native will stretch himself upon a rock as if asleep in the 

 sun, holding a piece of fish in his open hand ; the bird, be it 

 hawk or crow, seeing the prey, and not observing any' motion 

 in the native, pounces on the fish, and, in the instant of seizing 



'Voyages;' London, 1703-9, 5th ed. vol. i. p. 332. Bishop of Labuan, in Tr. 

 Eth. Soc. ; London, 1863, p. 29. G. W. Earl, ' Papuans ;' London, 1853, p. 76. 

 Mouhot, ' Travels in Indo-China,' etc. ; London, 1864, vol. ii. p. 133. Ellis, 

 'Madagascar;' vol. i. p. 307. Percy, ' Metaliui-gy ;' London, 1864, pp. 255, 

 273-8, 746. 



