TUB ETHNOLOGY OP THE INDIAN ARCHIPELAOO. 1 6 



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dearly established io llw pre-hiatoric time of any one nation give 

 us, as it weir, a footing in that era of the world. We may be 

 surrounded bv darkness which feint glimmerings only mny pierce 

 for a time. But when we have made advances to other points 

 or from other directions, and scattered our lights over the ancient 

 world, we shall find them numerous and near enough at particular 

 places to shew us, in faint outline, the old nations and their con- 

 nections. . 



The only entrance to this ancient world is through the present. 

 We cannot understand the true value or bearings of archaic facte, 

 unless our minds be imbued with a just sense of the nature and 

 operation of the various ethnic forces which are ruling mankind 

 now, as they must always have done. We must begin by making 

 ourselves acquainted with the causes and extent of the influences 

 which physical geography exercwes on nations, and which nations 

 .-.-is on each other/ Although me historic period ts r very con- 

 tracted one in the Indian Archipelago, it happens, from the great num- 

 ber of distinct tribo* and the favorable lotion ot many for receiving 

 ami communicating influences, that it presents a peculiarly rich 

 % nnd interesting field for the observation of modem ethnic phe- 

 nomena. In no other part of the globe are bo many races m 

 mutual contact. In none probably has there been a more constant 

 and various succession of foreign inHuences. Commerce, piracy, 

 conquest and religion liave each produced the most extensive dis- 

 turbances and changes. Civilizations of indipnous and foreign 

 origiL have caused particular races to expand till the old balance 

 of rntwer, or rather of barbarous "impotence and inertia, has l>een 

 d.-sLroyed, and wide spread conquests and colonisations have been 

 ih, r^'i,-,-quc>i.v. r I: i'^ Invc heciiensLaved t cxterrmnaU-d or forced 

 to retire from the open uthnic stage and its cml wing influences 

 into tlie obscurity and barbarism of nomadic jungle Ufe, while 

 other remnants of the ancient possessore of the land have sought a 

 precarious home in lonely creeb, coasts and islets. Civilisations, 

 and the languages and arts of civilised races, have also had their 

 conqueate of a quieter and more lasting kind. No fact m human 

 history is more striking than the mode and extent of the enirraftmenr. 

 of the religion, and much of the language, of ancient Indm, upon 

 the races of eastern Java. It is one of those preat and peaceful 

 revolutions of which we have a few parallel instances m other 

 parte of the world in historic times, and which, happening m 

 such a region, renders it necessary to bejir in mind the possdjihty 

 of similar events having taken place in more ancient periods. 

 At present a very great variety of ethnic phenomena is pre- 

 sented by the Ardupelftgo. There can hardly be a circum- 

 stance in its historic and archaic, times that has not a commentary 



• We h&ve<-«ufliwd onmhes in Hw Mk»vl«tr pan* fo a ipnwraJ , itatainrat afmich 



of Uimw JnfluK»n» « haw mu*t ,.|*:rttUil tm u> Imkmejjui tribe*. rUejubw- 

 qurni *p*xml papers cutUaiu a ouu* of Illustrative facta. 



