Note 69 — INTRODUCTION TO THE VOYAGE TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN. (continued 2)

Archæolog. vol. vi. p. 155. See also his History of Sumatra, p. 166, from which the following passage is transcribed. “Besides the Malaye, there are a variety of languages spoken on Sumatra, which, however, have not only a manifest affinity among themselves, but also to that general language which is found to prevail in, and to be indigenous to, all the islands of the eastern seas; from Madagascar to the remotest of Captain Cook’s discoveries, comprehending a wider extent than the Roman or any other tongue has yet boasted. In different places, it has been more or less mixed and corrupted; but between the most dissimilar branches, an eminent sameness of many radical words is apparent; and in some very distant from each other, in point of situation: As, for instance, the Philippines and Madagascar, the deviation of the words is scarcely more than is observed in the dialects of neighbouring provinces of the same kingdom.”