Able navigation was not confined to the waters of the Indian Ocean. We know how before the Christian era Hindu merchants and sailors traversed the Bay of Bengal, passed the Straits of Malacca and had flourishing settlements, temples and palaces in Bali and the great islands of the Java Sea. The Malay races in those islands had already proved themselves adventurous navigators. We do not know how early they left their mark on all the eastern kingdoms of the Bay of Bengal; on Ceylon, which was to them Pulo Selán “the island of gems;” and at various points along the coasts of India, as far west as Gujerat. The Chinese too have not been behindhand with their well-built vessels and the compass which they first employed to direct them. Long, long were they at work, before they had formed and perfected the enormous junks which so delighted Marco Paolo, with their well-caulked seams, their fifteen watertight compartments, their fifty cabins, their three hundred sailors and numerous families of women and children: ready to undertake long coasting voyages, or even run up the Straits to Ceylon, or visit the three Ports of India which they loved, and from which they were driven only four hundred years ago. The very finest of these vessels belonged, not to the northern ports of China, but to the harbours of Siam. Among all the Hindu and Arab vessels I have seen at Zanzibar, Calcutta and Bombay, none equalled in size and strength of build the noble Siamese junks, which I once found at anchor, after their annual voyage northward, in the bends of the Peiho. It is when these pursuits are in full activity that ability in their management is developed in its highest forms. And what more natural than that among these Arab and Siamese and Malay navigators there should appear, from time to time, men of genius to shape out new enterprises: or that among their chiefs and people there should arise another Prince Henry or Queen Elizabeth or Ferdinand and Isabella, to foster and encourage them?
Anyhow there the Malagasy are; a Malay people, following Malay customs, some of them possessing Malay eyes and hair and features; and all of them speaking a Malay tongue at the present hour. When they came, where they landed, what hindered their return, we know not. Was some large vessel caught in a furious cyclone and driven ashore? Were the first colonists few or many? Did they communicate with their friends and get others to join them? Were several settlements established at different points: was the colonisation continuous: if so, over how many years did it spread? Did Malay navigation extend to the east coast of Africa, and are Zambesi, Kilimány, Mombása, Kiloa, Masambika and other names there, of Malay origin, as Mr. Freeman suggested?
Judging from modern results, I incline to think that the original colonisation was not extensive; that the trade was found not to be remunerative; while navigation so far to the south was found to have special perils; and that the connecting link between Madagascar and Great Malaya was early severed. The population has increased but slowly during these long ages. Even now the Betsimisáraka tribes in their five divisions only just exceed a quarter of a million: the scattered Sákalávas, even in their wide and fertile plains, contentious and ever at feud with one another, cannot exceed half a million. The three Hova divisions are strongest in numbers, in civilisation and resources generally, and yet amount to less than a million and three-quarters altogether.
Hitherto the various writers on Madagascar in describing the population have all followed Mr. Ellis’s estimate of forty years ago. That estimate, amounting to 5,500,000, appears to be wholly inapplicable to the present day. It was to a large extent guess work, and included districts which had then scarcely been visited by an Englishman. I speak of the population, as (to a large extent) I saw it; and I estimate it as follows:—
Population of Madagascar.
| 1. Betsimisarakas, including— Sihánakas, 40,000; Tanálas, 20,000; Tankays, 50,000; Ikongos, 20,000 | 300,000 | |
| 2. Sakalavas, North and South | 500,000 | |
| 3. Hovas and Cognate Tribes:— | ||
| Imerina and Vonizongo | 1,000,000 | |
| Imámo and Mandridrano | 100,000 | |
| Betafo and Vákin ’Ankárat | 100,000 | |
| Betsileo | 300,000 | |
| Ibára, &c. | 200,000 | |
| ————— | 1,700,000 | |
| ————— | ||
| Total | 2,500,000 |
The results at present produced show at least three independent movements in the settlement of the island. The Betsimisárakas have lived a quiet life on the east coast, quite independent of the other tribes, and have quietly spread up the hills into the Tanála, the Sihánaka and Ankáy. And they have preserved in simple fashion the rough tongue of their forefathers in Sumatra. Whether the Sakalavas are one people, or have sprung from more than one colony, north and south, we know not. They have had constant wars with their neighbours above the hills, as well as among themselves. A dread of their courage and skill in war has established between them and those neighbours a Noman’s land of fifty or sixty miles in breadth. And their movements and their history seem to have been all along independent of others.
The only traditions and remnants of past history come from the Hovas, who also have been independent, and who having found opportunities of development not possessed by their fellows, have come to the front among the Malagasy tribes. They tell us how their original settlement was in the south-east of the island: when commenced, how developed, lasting how long, they do not know. Results show that here they became a strong people; and swarming off, they began to push their way up into the hills. Evidently they entered the upper plateau at its south-east corner; and while the foremost of the tribe pushed on, other branches gradually springing from it, and now named Betsileo and Ibára, filled in the districts behind. The advanced Hovas seem to have reached Imerina about eight hundred years ago. For perhaps a hundred and twenty years they were on friendly terms with a tribe which they found there, if not actually subject to them.
This tribe they call Vazimba. In the present day they talk of them as their ancestors; in the idolatrous days they were deified; and their tombs are still the most sacred objects in the country. Happily the Hova traditions give us the names of seven Vazimba kings. These names are as genuine specimens of Malagasy as the Hova names themselves. The Vazimba tombs are of the shape and structure of the usual Hova tombs, though of rude work and rough stones. So far therefore as we know anything about the Vazimba, they were a true Malagasy people: there is nothing African about them.
After a while the Vazimba and the strangers quarrelled. Contests arose and the Vazimba were driven out of the province; “to the south-west” says the story; and that means “into the unknown.” This superiority of the strangers, says tradition, was due to their use of iron. Whether they had iron while on the coast; whether their fathers had brought and retained any knowledge of its use; or whether they had learned it from their Arab friends and neighbours at Mátitánana: whether they had supplied themselves with iron-headed spears during their march up the Betsileo; or had only produced them on arriving in Imerina, from the iron hills of Amóronkáy, it is now impossible to say. But in the assertion that they knew the use of iron, while their opponents had only spears of wood, there is nothing improbable.