ABSTRACT
Indian islanders from their geographical situation, necessarily a maritime people.—Their maritime enterprises have never extended beyond those countries in the immediate neighbourhood of their own.— Their voyages usually coasting voyages. —Favoured by the steadiness of the monsoons, they occasionally assume a bolder character.—Derive some assistance from observing the heavenly bodies, and turn and then have recourse to the compass.—The compass known to them by a native name.—Possibly acquired in their intercourse with the Chinese.—Division of the circumference of the horizon by the Malays.—Inferences regarding their history and origin to be drawn from the nature of the terms used.—Division of the circumference of the horizon by the Javanese less perfect.—By the minor tribes.—Indian islanders have no specific term to distinguish the monsoons.— Ignorance of the Indian islanders on the subject of geography.—Hardly know any foreign country but by name.—Very imperfect knowledge of the countries they inhabit themselves.—They have no name by which to distinguish the whole group.—Generally ignorant of the insular form of the principal islands.—The word island used by them in a very circumscribed sense.—Principle on which names are given.—Hindus and Arabs proved, from the evidence of language, to have been ignorant of the true geography and topography of the Archipelago.
