* 



58 Til* ETHNOLOGY OF TH1L IK DUX ARCH IPRL AGO. 



of the ethnic evidence afforded by the Oceanic languages if 

 therefore exceedingly complicated, because we mat separate the 

 hi pi omau and the archaic affinities which have a positive value in 

 tracing the history of the insular races, from the primeval ones which, 

 for anything we know, may belong to a period when these races, and 

 those with which we compare them, had no separate existence. 



One general conclusion I have been led to adopt from an 

 accumulation of evidence of all kinds. This is that the human 

 history of the Archipelago is of very great antiquity; that no muMf 

 have yet been discovered of penetrating to its earliest inhabitants ; 

 thai, as might have been anticipated from its geographical position, 

 It has been more or less influenced not only by the history of the 

 tribeswho have successively occupied the adjacent Ultrnindian lands, 

 but by that of all the countries of Africa and Asia bordering on the 

 great Ocean, or connected with the Ocean lying lands. It is 

 probable that this connection with the seaboard of the continent, 

 and with the great movements and developments reflected by it from 

 the interior, began before the epoch at which positive records, 

 whether historical or archaic, commence; and it is certain that, since 

 that epoch, it has received influences, successive or contemporaneous, 

 continuous, temporary or intermittent, from Africa, Western Asia, 

 India, the Tibeto-Indian region, Burraah, Siam, Anam, China and 

 Japan. It is therefore probable that the Archipelago family 

 reflects the ethnic history of these lands. There is also an evident 

 connection with America, but I am by no means satisfied at 

 present that it has ever been direct, and al! that \ know inclines 

 me strongly to believe that it is entirely to be traced to the 

 common source in Asia, to which a large part of the ethnic 

 characteristics of both are clearly referable. 



It must, I think, be regarded as certain that the Archipelago 

 has a history contemporaneous with that of every civilised nation 

 on the great Ocean, and that, at the remotest period to which the 

 hist ry of any of those nations has yet reached, insular tribes 

 existed, having relations to continental tribes. I have not yet 

 found a single tribe to which an aboriginal or exclusively Asianesuui 

 character can be ascribed, and I am well assured that none will 

 ever be discovered. I have not yet found a tribe on the Continents 

 which can be regarded as the parent of any Asianesiau tribe, or 

 which we can positively pronounce to be older than any Asiaucsian 

 tribe. It is as difficult to say what the Asianesian races are not, 

 as to define what they are. Are they allied to the Chinese and the 

 adjacent nations to the westward? There are strongly marked 

 truits of all kinds which leave no doubt of the existence of such 

 an alliance. Is this alliance confined to any part of the insular 

 region, or to any of the Bormah-Chinese nations? It extends 

 from Sumatra to Easter Island ; it embraces Aakhoiog, Burmese, 

 Lau, Siamese, Anam and Chinese ingredients, as well as others 

 not so well recognized in these nations as in the many ruder 



