Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 2.djvu/271

 INDIAN ISLANDERS. 9.TI island with that great country, and speak of them relatively, as the countries on this or that side of the water. It is to Kalinga that the Javanese uni- versally ascribe the origin of their Hinduism ; and the more recent and authentic testimony of the Brahmins of Bali, who made me a similar assurance, as will be seen in another part of the work, is still more satisfactory. In accounting for the mode in which the Hin- dus were conveyed from their native country, there is no occasion to have recourse to the supposition of their hazarding a difficult and unknown voyage, for between the Coromandel coast and the Indian islands, a commercial intercourse has existed from time immemorial, which would afford the Indian priests a safe and easy conveyance. A passion on the part of the Hindus, in common with the rest of mankind, for the spices, and other rare productions of the Indian islands, gave rise to this commerce, which increased as the nations of the west improved in riches or civilization, for the trade of the people of Coromandel was the first link of that series of voyages, by which the produc- tions of the Archipelago were conducted even to the markets of Rome itself. The more considerable emigration which I have supposed to Java, in the end of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth centuries, may have had its origin in some political movement, or reli-