Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 2.djvu/110

92 GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE and are certified to have once belonged to the peo- ple of Java, by their existence (amidst a crowd of words still current) in the ancient language, as we find it both in manuscripts and on inscriptions : Sagala, all; dan, and ; diri,sef; lagi, yet ; makin, the more, by so much the more ; bah, inundation ; iasek, sea, lake ; tapi, border ; takut, fear ; tingle high, with many others. Even in the languages of the distant island of Celebes, we discover words in current use, which, in Java, are found only in books, and are obsolete on common occasions. The fate of some Sanskrit words in the different languages, though proof will be afterwards brought that all words of that tongue were probably introduced through the same chan- nel, will illustrate this in the most convincing manner. In the modern Javanese, there are two Sanskrit words for one in Malay, yet some Sanskrit words are in Malay current and popular, which in Javanese are either confined to books or obsolete, and a few occur in Malay which have no existence at all in modern Javanese, and for the detection of which, we must have recourse to ancient manu- scripts and monuments. The common circumstance of affinity between all the languages, both of the Indian Archipelago and Australasia, is the great Polynesian. I think it will be found, that the languages nearest to Java, in geographical position, or v/hich possessed in any re-