Kinship. ' 179 



called to these researches, various facts, especially linguistic 

 peculiarities, led me to think it probable that the moun- 

 taineers were the aborigines of that island, and that they 

 had been driven into the hills by the present occupiers of 

 the coastline. If this theory be correct, and if there were 

 two successive emigrations from Asia, the hillfolk probably 

 came with the first, and the coast tribes with the second. 

 We should then expect to find traces of the Malay system 

 among the mountaineers, and of the Turanian among the 

 coast tribes. And this is precisely what I have found. 



When we consider the immense area over which we have 

 discovered the system within the past twenty years, together 

 with the traces which we gather of it from ancient writers, 

 such as Herodotus, bk. i. cap. 216 ; and especially Csesar, 

 who, in his Commentaries, book v., cap. 14, speaks of our 

 own ancestors as having uxores inter se communes ; and 

 when we take into consideration also how painfully slow of 

 growth and development are progressive ideas, especially 

 when those ideas tend to purification by limiting self- 

 indulgence, we cannot but feel that these researches carry 

 us back far beyond the historic times into the very remotest 

 antiquity. They are far-reaching and intelligent guides 

 across that which without them is a trackless waste. By 

 their aid we have struck and followed a broad and well- 

 defined trail, where formerly we could discover but an 

 uncertain footmark here and there. In them we have a 

 voice speaking clearly and distinctl}^ to us from that which 

 has hitherto been a land of silence, and they shed a strong 

 light on what was heretofore a region of darkness, showing 

 us the forms of that shadowy host who bring up the rear in 

 the onward march, whereof we now are leading the van. 

 Thus at least it appears to me. 



N 2 



