From the remains of some Hindu and Jewish customs among the New Zealand branch of the Polynesian race, and the entire absence of any thing like Muhammadan customs, it is inferred that the Malay migration from the Indian Archipelago to Polynesia took place after the Hindu influence began to prevail there, and before the arrival of the Muhammadan traders and settlers from Arabia. Indian colonies were established in Java in the first century after Christ. But, according to Javanese annals, the first arrival of the Hindus in the Indian Archipelago from Western India occurred about A.D. 800, and the Muhammadan tradition to the Archipelago began in A.D. 1278. The date of the last migration is probably correct ; that of the Hindus, being more distant, is uncertain. From these two great events, it is inferred that the Malay ancestors of. the Polynesians. left the Indian Archipelago soon after the commence ment of the Christian era.
No trace of a written character has been founii in the wide extent of the islands of the Pacific. Most of them are probably too small to have furnished a population, at once sufficiently numer ous and concentrated, to generate the amount of civilisation requisite for the purpose.
The history of the nations along the southern borders of Asia has in every era exercised Loins influence on the Archipelago, and the importance of the international influences of the Archipelago itself may bo supposed from the circumstance, that while some writers have derived Malayan civilisation from an original source in Menang kabau, others have referred it to Java, and others to Celebes; whilst two of the ablest, Mr. Marsden and Mr. Crawford, have endeavoured to exhume a great nation whose civilisation preceded the Java nese, the Malayan, and the Bugis, and impressed itself more or less, not only on the Archipelago, but over all Polynesia. And the learned now
recognise that a great continent, with peculiar forms of animal life, once lay in the sea between Madagascar and the Archipelago.
In the Pacific Ocean, a westerly current fills the whole breadth of the tropical zone, from the coast of America to that of Australia and the Indian Archipelago. The cold Peruvian stream flows with great rapidity along the shores of Chili and Peru, and takes a westerly direction on reaching the neighbourhood of the line. It has everywhere a remarkably low temperature com parative to the latitude. After the current has assumed a westerly direction, its mean tempera ture does not exceed 20'5° R., but as it advances towards the west its temperature gradually rises to 27° or 28° R. On the western banks of the Pacific, the equatorial stream divides into several branches, Part of its waters flow to the south, a greater quantity penetrates through the channels of the South Asiatic Archipelago into the Indian Ocean, the remainder turns to the north-east, on the confines of the Chinese Sea, leaves the eastern coast of the Japanese islands, and then spreads its warm waters under the influence of north-westerly winds over the northern part of the Pacific. Then the Japanese stream plays here the same part as the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic, and exerts a similar, though less mighty, influence over the climate of the west coast of America, as it is neither so large nor so warm, and having to traverse a wider ocean, in higher latitudes, naturally loses more of its heat during the passage.—Cra afurd's Malay Dic.; Logan in J. Ind. Arch., 1848-1858 ; Ifartirig ; Captain Elphinstone Erskine's 1Vestern Pacific, p. 448 ; Marsden ; Wilkes' Narrative ; D' Voyages ; Captain Blackwood's Surrey.