10 THE PRESENT CONDITION OF 
Again, as we saw that the platform of the Archipelago is but an 
extension of the great central mass of Asia, and that the direction 
of the subterranean forces had determined the ranges of the land, 
so we find that its population is but an extension of the Asiatic 
families, and that the direction of migration was marked out by 
the same forces. But, separated by the sea from the great plains 
and vallies of the continent, having the grand aroules of commu¬ 
nication covered by mountains and dense and difficultly penetra¬ 
ble forest, the Archipelago could not be peopled by hordes, but 
must have owed its aborigenes to the occasional wandering of 
small parties or single families. The migrations from one island 
to another were probably^qually limited and accidental; and the 
small and scattered communinilies in such as were inhabited, must,, 
for a long period, have remained secluded from all others, save 
when a repetition of similar accidents added a few more units to 
the human denizens of the forests. 
>Ye cannot here attempt to retrace in the most concise manner 
the deeply interesting history of the tribes of the Archipelago, so 
exciting from the variety of its elements, and its frequent, though 
not impenetrable, mystery. We can but distinguish the two great 
eras into which it divides itself,-—that, at the commencement of which 
some of the inhabitants of the table land of Asia, having slowly 
traversed Ike south eastern vatlies and ranges, a work perhaps of 
centuries, appeared on the confines of the Archipelago, no longer 
nomades of the plains but of the jungles, with all the changes in 
ideas, habits, and language which such transformation implies, and 
prepared by their habits to give rise, under the influences of their 
new position, to the nomades of the sea;—and the second era, 
that, at the commencement of which the forest and pelagic no¬ 
mades, scattered over the interior, and along the shores, of the 
islands of the Archipelago, in numerous petty tribes, each with some 
peculiarities in its habits and language, but all bearing a family 
resemblance, were discovered in their solitudes by the earliest na¬ 
vigators from the civilized nations of the continent. 
The ensuing, or what, although extending over a period of about 
two thousand years, we may term the modern, history of the Ar¬ 
chipelago, first exhibits the Klings from southern India,—who were a 
civilized maritime people probably three thousand years ago,— 
