THE HUMAN SPECIES. 253 



tribes from the Malay peninsula, seamen from choice or neces- 

 sity, had long before laid the basis of the resident populations, 

 being in a more or less state of degradation by Oriental Negro 

 interunions. They formed the numerous pirate communities, 

 Orang Laut, Sea Gypsies, Jacalvas in Madagascar, Idaan, 

 Marootzie, Sea Dyaks in Celebes, Biagoos or Bragus in Bor- 

 neo, some partially sedentary, others entirely dwellers on the 

 seas, shifting their stations with the monsoon, so as to be 

 always under the lee of land ; and, among other supersti- 

 tions, like western Hindoos, sending a model canoe, cursed and 

 loaded with the sins of the people, far away on the ocean. 

 Their legends and romances, most particularly in Sumatra and 

 Java, are of Hindoo origin ; and vast temples of Indian divin- 

 ities, such as that of Boro-budor in Java, point to a Brahmin- 

 ical religious system prevailing there before the Arabian inno- 

 vations of Islam came among them. From families of these 

 tribes, rather than from pure Malays, the majority of the 

 Polynesian islanders are composed ; their chiefs still bearing 

 the marks of higher Caucasian castes than the vulgar, who 

 were, from the first, servants and rowers ; and both together 

 are the descendants of wanderers, blown off by untoward mon- 

 soons, in like manner as are still frequently witnessed, in a 

 similar condition, on most islands of the South Seas. 



While the European navigator and conqueror is invariably 

 held to be an enemy, nothing but ancient amicable reminis- 

 cences can account for the peaceful passage of Chinese and 

 Japanese traders through most, if not all, the seas infested by 

 the vast pirate fleets before mentioned. A tacit law of com- 

 mon affinity binds the inhabitants of the South Seas, even to 

 the most remote islands, sufficiently to receive among them the 

 shipwrecked or storm-driven wanderer on equal terms, excepting 

 where the resident population is of purer Papua stock ; for 

 these regard all others as conquerors, and usually treat them 

 in the light of victims. 



The South Sea islanders, beside feature, hair, and personal 

 22 



