68 SOUTHERN INDIA AND THE STRAITS. 



not only flourishes side by side with the hukum, but often over- 

 rides it when the two come into conflict. Of this adat, part is 

 immemorial usage, with its roots so deep in the past that they 

 may not be uncovered. Part, however, is of more modern 

 growth, and under this I should class all that these peoples have 

 derived from foreign influence. We have no historical data full 

 enough to enable us to separate these with accuracy ; yet to pre- 

 sume that the present civilization of Malays, over and above 

 what is included in their religion, was wholly indigenous and 

 pristine, is to reject such data as we do possess, to scorn the 

 testimony of language, and to assume that the Malayan races 

 possessed an ancient civilization of their own, of which there is 

 not a particle of evidence. 



The Arabs came to the Far East purely as traders accom- 

 panied, no doubt, by a few pandits or religious teachers, to 

 whose proselytizing agency was due the establishment of the 

 Mohammedan religion in the Archipelago. Some few would 

 seem to have settled- down, but, beyond the teaching which 

 found such ready listeners, they appear to have had little in- 

 fluence on native social life, and especial \y on the adat. Indeed 

 as good Moslems, they would feel bound to uphold the hukum 

 in. opposition to the latter. Whence, then, did the Malays get 

 the balance of their civilization, from the simpler arts which 

 separate them from the rudest of savages to the code of native 

 custom which, just as much as the Arab creed, gives them a right 

 to be regarded as a civilized race ? I unhesitatingly reply, from 

 India, and probably, by virtue of its proximity, from Southern 

 India. 



There are abundant traces, both in Sumatra and Java, but 

 especially in the latter, of the existence, long anterior to 

 Mohammedanism, of a very complete Hindu civilization. How 

 this came about, whether by conquest or pacific conversion, it is 

 now impossible to say. Nor have we any historical records to 

 show us what Hindu nation it was that exercised the first civilizing 

 influence. In Java, indeed, a great Hindu empire continued 

 rio-ht down to the year 1475 A. D., when the conversion to 

 Mohammedanism took place, and numerous runied shrines testify 

 how widespread was the earlier faith. But the conquering or 

 proselytizing Hindu stranger has entirely disappeared, for al- 



