Horatio Hale, the eminent anthropologist of the scientific expedition of the United States, was the first to approach the problem from a general point of view; he solved it as far as he was able with the data collected by himself, and sketched the first chart of Polynesian migrations. Fresh facts have been obtained since that time. Sir George Grey has published the historical songs of the Maories; Thomson, Shortland, and Hochstetter have brought to light fresh traditions; M. Remy published a history of Hawaii arranged by a native. M. Gaussin has carried off the prize in philology by his admirable work upon the Polynesian language; the Dépôt of the French Marine has received special documents from Tahiti to which General Ribourt, Admiral Lavaud, and Admiral Bruat have added the results of their own researches. These unpublished materials have been liberally placed at my disposal, and I have added to them some facts which have been forgotten. I have thus been able to confirm, from a general point of view, the conclusions of Hale, making, however, some important modifications, and to complete, again with some modifications, his chart of migrations. My readers will understand that I cannot here enter into a detailed discussion, and I must beg to refer them to my work upon _The Polynesians and their Migrations_. I shall confine myself to a short summary of the results which, I believe, it demonstrates. IV. Both physical and philological characters show that the Polynesians are a branch of those Malay races which are divided into numerous groups by shades of difference, sometimes strongly marked. It is to one of these groups which are least distant from the white type that the nations in question must be referred. The starting point of these migrations, which were to extend so far into the east, was Boeroe Island, which is represented in all maps between Celebes and Ceram. This conclusion, already proposed with some diffidence by Hale, seems to me to be placed beyond a doubt by all the traditions collected at Tonga by Mariner, with whose work the learned American seems to have been unacquainted. On quitting the Malay seas, the emigrants must have followed as nearly as possible the course given above. Repulsed doubtless by the black races which then, as now, occupied New Guinea, they passed Melanesia. Some canoes, however, probably separated from the others, reached the eastern extremity of this great island, and there founded a colony recently discovered by Commander Moresby. It is this colony which has doubtless furnished the several archipelagos of Melanesia with at least a part of the Polynesian elements which have been observed by several travellers. We know, however, thanks to the researches of M. de Rochas, that the Polynesian elements of the little archipelago of the Loyalty Islands is due to an emigration passing in 1770 from the Willis Islands to New Caledonia.