they have borrowed a few words from the languages of the civilised brown com-
plexioned people of the same islands.
In point of capacity, tested by social advancement, there is an immense difference
between the different negro races. The negros of the Andamans are abject savages,
in no way superior to the Australians, and, indeed, hardly on a level with them; and
tbose of the Malay Peninsula and the Philippines are erratic savages, living on the
precarious produce of the forest, and very little superior to them. Most of the negros
of -New Guinea, on the contrary, have fixed habitations, some knowledge of agriculture,
and have domesticated the hog; and those of the Feejee group in the Pacific
are on a par with the most civilised of the brown Polynesian race. In the present
state of our information, then, the only conclusion we can reasonably come to is, that
r a r ^re many different races of Asiatic Negros, wholly unconnected with the negros
of Africa or Madagascar,—equally so with the Australians, and not traceable to any
common origin. See Aeta, Papua, Samang.
NEGRO-MALAYAN EACE. By this name may be designated a variety of
the Man of the Malay Archipelago, certainly distinct from the Malay and the Papuan
but intermediate between them, or partaking of the characters of both. The stature
is the same as that of the Malay or Papuan. The complexion is deeper than
that of the first, but a good deal lighter than that of the last. The hair of the
head does not grow, as in the Papuan, in separate tufts, nor is it long and lank as
m the Malay. I t is uniform over the scalp, and either curls or frizzles. This race
embraces the aboriginal inhabitants of all the islands of the Archipelago, east of
oumbawa and Celebes, and west of New Guinea, with the exception of those of a
few on the immediate coasts of the latter, peopled by negros. This includes, hesides
small islands, Floris, Timiir, Gilolo, and Ceram, excluding Sumba or Sandal-wood
island, which is inhabited by the Malay race. In some of the smaller islands, the
character is less distinctly pronounced, as in the example of the five Molucca islets,
where by emigrations of Malays, Javanese, and natives of Celebes, there is a consider-
• Tki?’ mix^ure Malayan blood. No one bas bad personal experience of tbe
inhabitants of the islands to which I have referred, without being struck with the
difference which exists between them and the Malays. A judicious writer, who had
long resided in Timur, in giving an account of this island, and some of the adjacent
ones, thus describes the physical characteristics of its inhabitants : “ The natives are
generally of a very dark colour, with frizzled bushy hair, but they incline less to .the
Papuans than the natives of Ende (Floris). They are below the middle size, and
rather slight in their figure. In countenance they more nearly resemble the South-
Sea islanders than any of the Malay tribes.” The inhabitants of Solor, Sabrao, Pantar,
Ombay, and Wetter are described by him as resembling the people of Timur, “having
the same kind of frizzled hair, and very dark colour.” Of Solor he adds, § This island
and Floris appear to be the most westward islands in which the natives have frizzled
hair, as the people of Sumbawa, and of the islands to the westward of it, have invariably
straight hair. The form of countenance of the last, also, is entirely different, and
their manners and customs much less savage and ferocious.”—Notices of the Indian
A.rchipelago, by J. H. Moor, Singapore, 1837. The few of the aboriginal inhabitants
of Fions, whom I had myself occasion to see in Singapore, certainly agreed with the
character given by this intelligent writer, whose account was corroborated by the
statements made to me by Bugis merchants, settlers in Floris. Of these statements,
I find the following memorandum in a note-book, of the date of 1823 : “ Near half of
the tribes have woolly or curly hair, and negro features, but not in the same decided
degree as the inhabitants of New Guinea.”
Of the existence of the physical characters thus described there can be no question;
but it may be alleged to have arisen from an admixture, in the course of ages, of thé
Malay and Papuan races. This is, no doubt, possible, but we do not observe any such
admixture in progress,-—and from the repugnance of the races it is not likely to have
proceeded to any considerable extent. On the contrary, the coasts of several of the
islands are occupied by strangers of the Malay race, who hold themselves distant from
Îl “ habitants of the interior, while the line of demarcation which separates
the Negro-Malayan race from the Malayan to the west, and from the Negro to the
east, is sufficiently well defined. I t may even be remarked,/that it is the inhabitants
°r tY 1. an<?s 1 are nearest to those inhabited by the Malayan race, as in the case
of Moris, that most nearly approach to the Negro character, while it is those of the
inlands .nearest to New Guinea, as in the example of Timur, that partake least of
the Malay, tlie very reverse of what would have been the case from an admixture
of the two races. One strange anomaly, however, deserves notice. The inhabitants
of one small island, that of Rotti, in the very centre of those which I have
described as peopled by a Negro-Malayan race, is really inhabited by a Malayan
people. “The mhabitants,” says the anonymous writer, before quoted, “ are below
the middle stature, and considerably darker than the people of Celebes (the Malayan
race), but are remarkable for having long lank hair, whilst nearly the whole of the
inhabitants of the surrounding islands have frizzled hair. Their features are much
more prominent, and they bear a stronger resemblance to the natives of India than to
those of the Eastern islands. The women are much fairer than the men, and have,
many of them, very pleasing countenances. They are esteemed a mild-tempered
people, and are certainly not a jealous one.”—Notices of the Indian Archipelago, by
J. H. Moor. The resemblance to tbe Hindu features here supposed, implies, probably,
nothing more than a strong contrast with the half-Papuan ones of the inhabitants
of Timur, to which the writer was most accustomed.
NEGROS (ISLA DE). The island of Negros, so called from the number of the
Negritos or Aetas found in it by the Spaniards, is one of the Philippines called the
Bisayas. It lies between Panay to the north-west and £ebu to the east, divided
from them by narrow straits from a league to three leagues broad. South from
it is the island of Mindano, distant about 30 miles. Negros is 37 leagues long by
from 6 to 10 leagues in breadth, and is computed to have an area of 260 square
leagues, or according to other estimates 3827 square miles. Its coast is very little
broken by bays or inlets, and does not contain any good harbour. A central chain
of mountains runs through it from north to south, which attains its greatest height
towards the latter point. The rivers are but of small size and unfit for the navigation
of vessels of burthen. The largest is the Ilog, which falls into the sea on the
western side of the island, and on which lies the chief town of the same name. The
forest-clad mountains contain deer, hogs, and buffalos, with monkeys. The chief
inhabitants are of the Bisaya nation, the same which peoples Panay, Qebu, and
Leyte. The Augustine monks began early to convert them to Christianity, which
was completed by the Jesuits who entered on the task in 1623. On their expulsion,
the Dominicans succeeded them.
Negros forms, at present, a province by itself, although formerly united to Qebu
and to parts of Panay. By the census of 1850, it contained 31 townships or districts,
and a population of 58,773 inhabitants, exclusive of the Negritos or other wild
tribes, of whom the Spanish writers give no account. Out of this population 12,856
were subject to the poll-tax or tribute, which amounted to 128,360 reals of plate. The
density of population is little more than 15 to the square mile, a small rate, which
would seem to prove that Negros is one of the poorest of the larger islands of the
Philippines. The chief products of the soil, which although mountainous is fertile,
are, rice, cotton, and abaca, with the coco and gomuti palms. The first of these
articles is exported, and from the second and third, various tissues are woven for
export, and cordage is manufactured from the gomuti.
NEIRA, correctly, Pulo-NERA, th a t is, in Malay, “ Palm-wine Island,” is the
name of one of the islets which form the little group of the Banda or nutmeg
islands. Neira, although much smaller than Lon tar or the Great Banda, is the seat
of the Dutch local administration and the most populous of the whole group, having
had, by an enumeration made in 1840, besides slaves and convicts, 1225 inhabitants.
NEW GUINEA. The most northerly part of this vast island is only twenty
miles south of the equator, while its most southerly is in latitude 8° 22' south. From
east to west, it is 1400 miles in length. It is conjectured to have an area of 200,000
square miles, which would make it about twice the extent of all the British islands
put together. To the south, it is divided from Australia by a sea only 80 miles
broad, and to. the north it is washed by the Pacific Ocean, while to the west >it has
Ceram and the other islands of the Molucca Sea. New Guinea is composed of two
peninsulas, an eastern and a western, the first by far the largest. This is effected by
the deep gulf of Geelvink, which penetrates it so deeply from the northern side, as
to leave an isthmus not exceeding 20 miles in breadth. Indeed, the island may be
said to consist of even three peninsulas, for the western or smaller one is itself so
deeply penetrated from the south by Mackluer’s narrow gulf, as to make an isthmus
between it and the western side of the bay of Geelvink, which does not exceed 40
miles broad. Of the whole island we know but a little, and this confined to a few
spots of its sea coast. Of the interior, we know no more than Dampier and his