POPVLATION 
6i 
the most correct estimate of the origin of the Malagasy 
tribes, and I myself, at the same time and independ¬ 
ently of him, came to a similar conclusion. This emi¬ 
nent French traveller treats the Malagasy as a mixture 
of two elements, ethnographically and anthropologically 
entirely distinct, the one embracing the Hova settled in 
the central province and on isolated points on the coast, 
and the other made up of the tribes which inhabit the 
rest of the periphery of the island. 
Grandidier regards the Hova and them only as 
genuine Malays, who have made their way into the 
country from Java or a region near to it. The negroid 
elements, according to him, point to the district of Indo- 
China in their customs and religious conceptions. In 
this latter point I am obliged to diher from him, as I 
hold the second element, so far as it has remained 
without admixture, to be of genuine African origin. We 
have obviously to do with negro tribes which have come 
from South East Africa. As soon as we leave the east 
coast and enter the district of the Sakalava on the west 
the African stamp of the population becomes unmistak¬ 
able. 
As to when the first settlement of Madagascar took 
place we have no kind of historical data, and the tradi¬ 
tions of the people give us no distinct indication as to 
the time of arrival either of the negroes or of the Hova. 
Opinions are still divided on the question whether the 
Hova were before or after the African population, but 
Ratzel may very likely be right in thinking that the 
influx of Asiatic peoples took place over a stratum of 
already existing African peoples. 
Mention is often made in literature of an aboricrinal 
population, which existed before the Malayan immi¬ 
gration. In the central province, now inhabited by the 
Hova, there are found various stone heaps of irregular 
form, which are looked upon as the burial places of an 
