Page:A Grammar and Dictionary of the Malay Language with a Preliminary Dissertation- Dissertation and Grammar, in Two Volumes, Vol. I (IA dli.granth.52714).pdf/299

 I imagine this may not inaptly be compared to the infusion of Latin which we find in the Irish, the Welsh, and Armorican.

That the Malayan words, fancifully imagined to afford evidence of a kind of universal language, proceeded from Sumatra and Java is demonstrated by the fact of their being found to diminish in amount as we recede, either by distance or other difficulty of communication, from those islands, and by their increasing as we approach them. I may give the proportions in 1000 words for some of the principal languages in proof. In the language of Madura, separated from Java only by a narrow Strait, it is 675; in the language of the Lampungs of Sumatra, conterminous with the Malays, it is 455; in the Bali, it is 470; in the Bugis of Celebes, it is 326; in the Kayan of Borneo, 114; in the Kisa, the language of an island between Timur and New Guinea, it is 56; in the Tagala of the Philippines, it is 24; in the Madagascar, 20, and in the Sandwich island dialect of the Polynesian, 16.

In corroboration of this argument, I may state that the Sanskrit and Arabic languages follow a similar proportion, in those insular languages in which they exist. Of the first Java, and of the last Sumatra were the chief seats. In 1000 words the Javanese itself contains about 110 words of Sanskrit; the Malay about 50; the Bugis 17; the Tagala of the Philippines fewer than 2; the Madagascar contains about half-a-dozen words in the whole dictionary, and the great pro- bability is, that the Polynesian contains none at all. Of Arabic, the Malay contains about 52 words in 1000; the Madura about 35, and the Bugis about 13. In the whole Tagala dictionary, I can find only 12 words, and in the Polynesian language, there is not one at all.

Instead of considering all the languages within the wide bounds described as mere dialects of one tongue, the results of my own enquiry confirm me in concluding that they are in- numerable. Within the Archipelago and the Philippines, all the languages differ in their elementary parts and in the majority of their words, so as to make it impossible to avoid coming to the conclusion that they are distinct and inde- pendent tongues. Within those limits, there are what may be