The ancestors of the Hawaiians could have learned their marine skill, and probably did so, on the shores of the Arabian Sea and off the estuary of the river Indus, also in the Bay of Bengal and off the mouths of the River Ganges, and later, in the seas of Indonesia.
The Polynesians are pre-eminently a race of excellent seamen, due to centuries of a sea-faring life. The early members of that nation, upon their entry into the Pacific Ocean, perhaps in dhows and praus, but later as canoe-men, were skillful, fearless and as successful a race of navigators and explorers as the world has ever produced; poorly fitted out for ocean travel in frail craft; nevertheless the Polynesians pursued boldly a course into an unknown, vast ocean, where possible storms, thirst, starvation, shipwreck and death awaited them.
Some probable points of departure of the primal Polynesian emigrants, seeking new homes in the various islands of the Pacific, can be found at Sawaii and Kawaahae on the north coast of the island of Ceram (?Ceylon), one of the Molucca islands; thence they could pass due north up the Gilolo channel and enter the Pacific, leaving Pulo Morotai (Island of Molokai) to the northwest, then steering a course along the north of New Guinea and the Solomon Islands due east towards Samoa.
To escape the Mongoloid hordes, who were crushing and crowding them out in Indonesia, the Polynesians in their travels appear always from necessity and safety to have chosen the path of least resistance, the ocean; with its currents and winds, aided by sails and paddle power, it is a motor of comparative ease and progress, and also of sustenance, providing abundance of fish, limu (edible seaweed), etc.
The early Polynesians, armed with their knowledge of trade winds, ocean currents, the stars, and with their skill as fishermen, reduced to a minimum the prospects of ocean disasters or pilikias. On the ocean’s broad expanse no enemy could ambuscade them, nor were perils of this kind liable to be encountered. Under all the above conditions of ocean traveling the Polynesian navigators were enabled to explore and discover many new and hitherto unknown islands in the largest ocean of our globe, the Pacific.
The Polynesian speech or language is distinctly not of Malay or Mongoloid origin; research indicates that Indonesia was its home and that it must have been in use for centuries before the Malay came into the field. Due to the invasion of this race, some of their words became engrafted on to the Polynesian, they did not and have not materially changed it, hence, without any sufficient reason, the name Malayo-Polynesian is in common use to designate a language which is 85 per cent. Polynesian.
The Polynesians are absolutely a separate and distinct race from the Malays. The pure Polynesian type, such as most of aboriginal Hawaiians, has the following characteristics: Tall, skin brown or olive, brown eyes, abundant black wavy hair, ARYAN features, cleanly, cheerful, artistic, intellectual, gentle, polite and dignified, poetical, musical.
Their long type of skull and its capacity resembles in part the European. Every one of the above properties is lacking in the Malay, but the ancient Hindu and the Persian possessed every one of them; it is to these races that the primal Polynesians can be traced and hence their identification in the Pacific presents no problem that cannot be solved.