variations are created by the monsoons, which bring the wet and
dry seasons.

The heavy rains of the tropics tend to leach the soil; in the non-
volcanic regions, such as parts of Sumatra and Borneo, the land
does suffer from this process. But the rains which fall on the
volcanic islands combine with a soil constantly renewed by volcanic
activity to create one of the most fertile areas of the world.

Indonesia is often referred to as an anthropologist's wonderland
because of the extraordinary variety of ethnic groups throughout
the country. This variety arises from the countless waves of migra-
tions of people which flowed through Indonesia in prehistoric times.
The islands for thousands of years were used as a land bridge by
migrants moving through Southeast Asia, down the Malayan Pen-
insula, and out into the islands of the archipelago. As each succeed-
ing wave of migrants arrived, the more ancient primitives were
pushed out of the desirable areas; they retreated to the mountainous
interiors, to the jungles and swamps and to the remoter islands.
Some of them penetrated all the way to Australia and Tasmania;
others moved out into the Pacific and populated the islands of
Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. Anthropologists for this reason
have termed the archipelago the threshold of Oceania.

Today, the heavily populated western islands are dominated by
the Malay type; as one moves eastward, the racial type changes to a
mixture of Malay, Melanesian, Negroid and Papuan strains. In New
Guinea, the natives are predominantly Papuan.

The most fascinating area of all is the Flores-Timor region op-
posite the northern coast of Australia. These islands are a living
museum of all the racial types which have passed through the
archipelago. Here one can distinguish not only Malays, Veddoids
and Negritos, but also the archaic Melanesian, with his frizzy hair
and very dark skin, ancestors of the modern Melanesians of the
Solomon Islands, Fiji, and other Pacific islands. Here also one sees
the beetling brows and coarse features of the most ancient ethnic
type of all -- the Australoid type -- the ancestors of the aborigines of

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