CHAPTER XVIL

MIGRATIONS BY SEA.-POLYNESIAN MIGRATIONS.--MIGRA

TIONS TO NEW ZEALAND.

I. THE greater number of the defenders of autochthony allow that there is no fundamental impossibility in migration by land, but maintain that it is different in migrations by sea. The peopling of America, and especially that of Polynesia, by emigrants from our great continent, is, in their opinion, far more than could possibly be undertaken or accomplished by nations unacquainted with the science of astronomy, and the improved method of navigation. According to them, geographical conditions, winds and currents, must oppose an insurmountable obstacle to any enterprise of this nature.

Starting from Polynesia, let us see how much truth there is in these assertions. This will be taking, so to speak, the bull by the horns, for no other part of the globe seems to justify to such an extent, the opinions of autochthonists.

II. Polynesia is not quite so isolated as we are accustomed to think. A study of the map alone should be sufficient to justify us in holding that a maritime people, accustomed to the navigation of the Malay Archipelago, might, on some occasion, have pushed as far as New Guinea. This fact is now established above all dispute. Beyond New Guinea, the Archipelago of New Britain and the Salomon Islands would put, so to speak, any fairly adventurous navigators on their way to the Fiji Islands; once arrived at this archipelago, however little they may have been impelled by the spirit of discovery, they must easily have reached Polynesia properly so called. New Zealand to the south, and the Sandwich

Islands to the north, remain, however, beyond the limits of this route, as it is pointed out by geography.

For bold mariners to be stopped in their advance, winds and currents must have been invariably contrary and irresistible. The stronger the belief in the universality and absolute constancy of the trade winds in these regions, the more was this action attributed to them. But the investigations which have been carried on in the interests of science, the writings of Commander Maury, and the charts of Captain Kerhallet, have taught us that the variable winds due to the cloud-ring extend over almost twenty degrees in the maritime area in question. We know, moreover, that every year the monsoon drives back the trade winds and blows beyond the Sandwich and Tahiti Islands, so that instead of the winds being contrary, they are, for many months, very favourable for ships sailing eastward.

Considerations drawn from currents lead almost to the same conclusions. In the Pacific, the equatorial current running from east to west forms in reality two great distinct oceanic streams separated by a large counter current flowing in the reverse direction. The latter skirts almost the whole northern portion of the Polynesian area; it thus, as it were, forms the outlet from the Indian Archipelago. There is every indication of its having played some part in the history of the dispersion of races in all parts of Oceania and to the east of the Malay peninsula.

Finally, we know that there is no absolute regularity in the atmospheric phenomena in the regions of the Pacific, any more than elsewhere. This ocean has in common with others its typhoons and its tempests, which suddenly change the direction of the winds and carry ships before them in spite of currents. Islands, both large and small, with which it is beset, must often have been visited by sailors who had thus lost their way, of which we shall presently quote examples.

Far from being impossible, the peopling of Polynesia by navigators starting from the Indian Archipelago is relatively

easy at certain times of the year, provided only that the navigators are courageous and not afraid of losing sight of land. Now we know the character of the Malay populations in this respect.

Again, those who have taken all these circumstances into consideration, Malte-Brun, Homme, Lesson, Rienzi, Beechey, Wilkes and others, have not hesitated to regard Polynesia as having been peopled by migrations advancing from west

to east.

III. Writers, on the contrary, who have only consulted the imperfect knowledge which we till lately possessed of these seas, and the ordinary direction of the winds, have either believed in autochthony or have invented various theories to explain the presence of man in this multitude of islands and remote islets.

Ellis held that the Polynesians had been conveyed from America to Oceania by winds and currents, but this hypothesis has had scarcely any adherents. It is in too direct contradiction with all the physical, philological, and social characters, which refer the Polynesians to the Malay races as strongly as they separate them from the Americans.

Dumont d'Urville has proposed a theory which, at first sight, is more satisfactory, and still has a few supporters. In his opinion, Polynesia is the remains of a great continent which was originally connected with Asia. This land sank after some geological revolutions; the sea covered the plains and hills, the highest summits only being now visible and forming the present archipelago. The Polynesians are the descendants of those who survived the catastrophe.

This hypothesis has the advantage of preserving those relations which were broken by that of Ellis. And, curious to relate, it agrees with the tradition of the deluge as preserved by the Tahitians. They say that the great inundation happened without either rain or tempest. It was the sea which rose and covered the whole earth with the exception of a flat rock where one man and a woman took

refuge. We might say that there was nothing in this account but a mistake which is easily understood. The sea never rises, but the land may sink, and other people besides the Tahitians have been deceived.

Nevertheless, we cannot accept the theory of Dumont d'Urville. It is in contradiction to the zoological facts so thoroughly investigated by Darwin and Dana. If some of the atolls of Oceania shew signs of subsidence, a great number of islands offer incontestable proofs of upheaval, and Tahiti itself is one of the latter.

But the most serious argument which can be brought against d'Urville is derived from the inhabitants themselves. If travellers agree upon one point, it is that from the Sandwich Islands to New Zealand, from the Tonga Islands to Easter Island, all the Polynesians belong to the same race, and speak the same language with mere variations of dialect.

Now the Polynesian area, the limits of which I have just pointed out, is of greater extent than the whole of Asia. What would an Asiatic Polynesia be like, if that continent were to sink beneath the waters and leave only the summits of its mountains visible, where some representatives of the present inhabitants might take refuge? Is it not at once evident that each archipelago, and often each island, would have its own race and language?

The considerations drawn from the identity of populations and languages in Polynesia are of themselves sufficient to justify the assertion that all the Islanders have a common origin; and consequently, that, starting from some unknown point, they have, in their advance from archipelago to archipelago, peopled by degrees the maritime world in which we find them.

Horatio Hale, the eminent anthropologist of the scientific expedition of the United States, was the first to approach the problem from a general point of view; he solved it as far as he was able with the data collected by himself, and sketched the first chart of Polynesian migrations. Fresh

facts have been obtained since that time. Sir George Grey has published the historical songs of the Maories; Thomson, Shortland, and Hochstetter have brought to light fresh traditions; M. Remy published a history of Hawaii arranged by a native. M. Gaussin has carried off the prize in philology by his admirable work upon the Polynesian language; the Dépôt of the French Marine has received special documents from Tahiti to which General Ribourt, Admiral Lavaud, and Admiral Bruat have added the results of their own researches. These unpublished materials have been liberally placed at my disposal, and I have added to them some facts which have been forgotten. I have thus been able to confirm, from a general point of view, the conclusions of Hale, making, however, some important modifications, and to complete, again with some modifications, his chart of migrations. My readers will understand that I cannot here enter into a detailed discussion, and I must beg to refer them to my work upon The Polynesians and their Migrations. I shall confine myself to a short summary of the results which, I believe, it demonstrates.

IV. Both physical and philological characters show that the Polynesians are a branch of those Malay races which are divided into numerous groups by shades of difference, sometimes strongly marked. It is to one of these groups which are least distant from the white type that the nations in question must be referred.

The starting point of these migrations, which were to extend so far into the east, was Boeroe Island, which is represented in all maps between Celebes and Ceram. This conclusion, already proposed with some diffidence by Hale, seems to me to be placed beyond a doubt by all the traditions collected at Tonga by Mariner, with whose work the learned American seems to have been unacquainted.

On quitting the Malay seas, the emigrants must have followed as nearly as possible the course given above. Repulsed doubtless by the black races which then, as now, occupied New Guinea, they passed Melanesia. Some canoes,