Volume 14 Australasia - dana ward's homepage

INDONESIA.G7and their conquests have been the work of one or another isolated group.Numerous petty Malay states have thus been founded, but the race has createdno great empires. The diversity presented by their domain, divided into athousand little insular mother countries, is thus reflected in their historic evolution.But the political unity, which has failed to be spontaneously developed, isbeing accomplished under foreign supremacy. The Europeans, who have occupiedthe whole of America, two-thirds of Asia, and one-half of Africa, havealso made themselves masters of the Eastern Archipelago. A single Europeanpower, and one of the least importance in a military sense, dominates almostexclusively in this vast insular world comprised between Indo-China and Australia.Historic Retrospect.Under the guidance of Arab pilots, the Portuguese navigators and Italiantravellers appeared early in the sixteenth century in the Sunda waters, and in1511, Albuquerque, already master of the great city of Malacca, secured for hisnation the political preponderance in the Malay world. The very next year thefirst consignment of nutmegs was shipped, in the Banda group, direct for Lisbon.In order more rapidly to explore every part of their new domain, the Portugueseresolved that all vessels, whether Malay, Chinese, or Javanese, trading withMalacca, should henceforth be commanded by a European captain. In this waythe Eiu'opean mariners in a few years became familiar with the labyrinth ofIndonesian maritime routes, thus securing for themselves the monopoly of the spicetrade between the Moluccas and Lisbon.Doubtless the Spaniards, led by Magellan, soon appeared on the scene, in theirturn claiming the exclusive right to the possession of the coveted " Spice Islands."In virtue of Alexander VI. 's famous bull, dividing the world recently discovered,or yet to be discovered, between the two Iberian powers, to Portugalfell all the lands situated in the far East. But Spain on her part claimed thesesame lands, as lying in the far West beyond the New World, and to put an endto these conflicts the Portuguese were fain to redeem by purchase the islands indispute.Of these they remained peaceful possessors for nearly a century ;but in 1596the Dutch flag, which had been excluded by Philip II. from the direct trade withLisbon, had already discovered the road to the East. The broad-beamed Dutchvessels made their appearance before Malacca and helped themselves to the spicesof the native factories. Such was the commercial enterprise inspired by the twobrothers Houtman, who bore the Portuguese a grudge for their imprisonment inLisbon, that within seven years the Amsterdam and Antwerp shippers hadequipped fifteen fleets for the Eastern Archipelago, comprising altogether sixtyfivevessels.In 1600 the new arrivals secured a strip of territory in Sumatra, andin IGIO they obtained a footing in Java, where they erected a fort, afterwards