22 LANGUAGES OF SOUTHERN INDOCHINA. 



wide differences in lexicographical material between the latter 

 and the Malayan languages , that some authorities have been 

 misled into denying the existence of a Mon-Annam family and 

 asserting that Cainbojan should be classifled as a member of the 

 Malayan group. 



So far as it goes, this list of words serves to illustrate the 

 subject of this paper by giving another instance of the traces 

 of a Malayan influence in Iudo-China, which must be of very 

 ancient date, and which is obviously an important element to be 

 considered in relation to the unsolved problem of the origin of 

 the Malayan races. 



Many considerations point to the conclusion that at least 

 some part of the ancestry of those races* is of continental 

 Asiatic origin : there are anthropological reasons, which I am 

 unable to deal with, but which have been summed up roughly 

 (and not very accurately) in the "phrase "Mongoloid type;" 

 ethnographical considerations, such as were dwelt upon by the 

 late Sir Henry Yule f and others, specially a curious agreement 

 between the races of the Archipelago and those of Indo-China 

 in a considerable number of points of detail regarding customs 

 and usages (a kind of evidence, which though very weak if 

 depending merely on one or two points of agreement, is in its 

 nature cumulative and gains strength in an increased ratio as 

 additional points are discovered) ; and, finally, there is the 

 linguistic evidence, the investigation of which is, however, 

 involved in many preliminary difficulties. It is to be feared, 

 for instance, that the late Mr. J. R. Logan's achievements in 

 this direction are not a safe basis for further enquiries to start 

 from. On the other hand Professor Kern,:j: by a comparison of 



* I refer here more particularly to the true Malayan races 

 inhabiting the western half of the Indian Archipelago, to whom 

 alone the anthropological argument applies. How it is that 

 the totally distinct stocks known as Papuan, Polynesian, Micronesian, 

 etc., come to speak languages that cannot be severed from the Malayan 

 family, is another problem, also at present awaiting solution. There 

 seems, however, no doubt that it is the case, in spite of the 

 difficulty of finding an explanation for it. 



t Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 1880. 



X In the paper to which a reference will be found below, the 

 most conclusive, perhaps, of these words are the names for sugar-cane, 



Jour. Straits Branch, 



