elements of many and diverse characters, which show in the people as we know them. It could not be otherwise, looking to the migrations of the race, and the various peoples they must have had more or less communication with in their long progress eastwards from the Fatherland. On their way to the East they must at one time have been in frequent contact with the Papuan or Negritto race of Indonesia, and subsequently with the less strongly marked Negritto people of the Melanesian Islands, besides, as we shall indicate, with some white race, all of which have left their marks on the people, in their physique, their customs and their traditions.
It is unfortunate that up to the present time, no comprehensive study of the craniology of the Polynesian race as a whole has been made. What has been done in this respect—a mere nibbling at the edges, as it were—bears out the mixed Papuan and Melanesian character of the Polynesians. But to satisfy science as to the origin of the people, something much more systematic is required.[1]
Failing the more exact craniological data, we have to fall back on philology, manners and customs, physical appearances and traditions of the race, to determine their origin. In what follows we shall touch on these various aspects from time to time, but this account is mainly derived from the reasonable interpretation that may be placed on the traditions of the race—others more competent can deal with the question from the other aspects. And here, I would like to say, that in my humble opinion the European Ethnologist is frequently
- ↑ When in Eastern Polynesia in 1897, I met a German Doctor (whose name has escaped me) who had been for ten years in various islands collecting skulls and other anthropological specimens, but I have never seen the result of his labours.
