The Malay archipelago : the land of the orang-utan ... - Wallace Online

454 THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO.L'"ap.It is, however, quite possible, and perhaps probable, tliat thebi'own Polynesians were originally the produce of a mixture ofMalays, or some lighter coloured Mongol race Avitli the darkPapuans ; but if so, the intermingling took place at such aremote epoch, and has been so assisted by the continuedinfluence of physical conditions and of natural selection, leadingto the preservation of a special type suited to tliose conditions,that it lias become a fixed and stable race with no signs ofmongrelism, and sliowing sucJi a decided preiDonderance ofPapuan character, that it can best be classified as a modificationof the Papuan tyi^e. The occurrence of a decided Malay elementin the Polynesian languages lias evidently nothing to do withany such ancient physical connexion. It is altogether a recentphenomenon, oi'iginating in tlie roaming habits of the chief]Malay tribes ; and this is proved by the fact that we find actualmodern words of the Malay and Javanese languages in use inPolynesia, so little disguised by peculiarities of pronunciationas to be easily recognizable—not mere Malay roots only to bedetected by the elaborate researches of the iihilologist, as wouldcertainly have been the case had their introduction been asremote as the origin of a very distinct race—a race as difFei'entfrom the Malay in mental and moral, as it is in physicalcharacters.As bearing upon this question it is important to point out theliarmony which exists between the line of seimration of thehuman races of the Arcliipelago and that of the animal productionsof the same country, which I have already so fullyexplained and illustrated. The dividing lines do not, it is true,exactly agree ; but I think it is a remarkable fact, and somethingmore than a mere coincidence, that tliey should traversethe same district and ajjproach eacli other so closely as they do.If, however, I am liglit in my sui)position that the region wherethe dividing line of the Indo-Malayan and Austro-Malayanregions of zoology can now be drawn, was formerly occupied bya much wider sea than at jDresent, and if man existed on theeartli at that period, we shall see good reason why the racesinhabiting tlie Asiatic and Pacific areas should now meet andpartially intermingle in tlie vicinity of tliat dividing line.It has recently been maintained by Professor Huxley that thePapuans are more closely allied to the negroes of Africa than toany other race. The resemblance both in physical and mentalcharacteristics had often struck myself, but the ditficuTties intlie Tvay of accepting it as probable or i:)0ssible have hithertoprevented me from giving full weight to those resemblances.Geographical, zoological, and ethnological considerations renderit almost certain that, if these two races ever had a commonorigin, it could only have been at a period far more remote thanany which has yet been assigned to the antiquity of the humanI'ace. And even if their unity could be proved, it would in noway affect my argument for the close affinity of the Papuan and