Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 3.djvu/223

 ASIATIC NATIONS. 207 ries thereafter that we have reason to believe that the Arabs carried on a busy direct intercourse with the Indian islands, and settled there in numbers. Then we discover them converting the natives of the country to their religion, and trace the exten- sion of their commerce along with it, from the year 1204, when the Achinese, 1 278 when the Malays of Malacca, 1478 when the Javanese, and 1495 when the people of the spice islands, were convert- ed. I have little doubt but the increased trade of the Arabs with the Indian islands, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, arose out of the conse- quences of the crusades, — which made the nations of the east and west better acquainted with each other, — enlarged the ideas of both, — gave the west- ern nations an increased taste for the productions of the east, — and, consequently, occasioned an in- creased demand for them in the markets of Arabia. We discover by their consequences three distinct eras of the intercourse of the Arabs with the In- dian islands, each of which may naturally be traced to have sprung from their domestic prosperity. The first was in the ninth century, which is coeval with the government of the celebrated Caliphs of bit, ebony, red-wood, all sorts of spice, and many other things too tedious to be enumerated. At present, the com- merce is carried on between this island and that of Oman. " Harris's Collection, Vol. 1. p. 543.