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Show 54 ON TIIE DISTRIDUTION AND lation in race very approximate to the Tartar, and which was, consequently, it elf allied to tho Finnish race, did precede the Aryas in old Ilindostan. One must not judge of tho intoll ctual and social condition of those ahorio-inos from tho literary movement that has boon wrought in the body of the Tamoul, which was tho counterblast of that grand intoll ctual movement rcprcsontod to us by the Sanscrit, and was certainly due to tho Aryan influence. In order to judge what these primitive populations of Ilindostan had been, one must go and study their scattered remains. This has boon done, quite in recent times, by tho Englisll, to whom we owe some mo t interesting details about these antique tribes. These debris of primeval Indian nationality are now distributed in three distinct parts of the peninsula. Tho first are met w1 th in the heart of the Mahanuddy, as far as Cape Com orin; being the Bhecls, the Tudas, the Mora , the Coles, the Gondes or Khonds, the Soorahs, tho Paharias, &c. The second inhabit the northern section towards the Ilimalaya; such are the Radjis or Doms, and the Brahouis. The third occupy the angle that separates the two peninsulas of India, and which is designated by the name of A sam, as well as that mountainous band constitutin o- the frontier between B ngal and Thibct. b Tho. whole of tllCse tribes live even now as they lived very many c.entuncs ago. They arc agricultural population , who, from time to t1mc, cl ar with fil'c a portion of tho jungle or the forest. The word which, amonO"st the c people, renders tho idea of culture, signifies nothing else than tho cutting down of the forest. The Aryas, on the contra~y, were a pastoral people; and in India, as in many other countnos, the sh phcrds triumph d over tho farmers. Everything, furthermore, announces among these Dravidian people much gentleness of chara~tcr~ which is a~ain a distin tive trait of the Mongols and of the Fuun h populatwns. Their worship must have been that naturalistic jj tishism which remains the rolio-ion of the Bodos the Dh~1~als, and th~ Gondcs. They ador d objects of nature. The; had dCltJCs that prcs1d d over tho different clas es of beinO"s and the principal a ts of life; and they knew naught of sacerd~tal castes or of any other re~ular organization of wor hip. Some u. ages, preserved even at this day among s veral of these indigenous tribes show us that woman, at lea t the wife, enjoyed among them a ve1; great degree of independence. Tho fa:ts accor l, then, with linguistics to show us how within tb.at .portion of A ia comprehended between the Euphra~es and Tigris, and the Indus, there had cxi ted a more intellio-ent and stronger race, that, at a very early day, divided itself into two CLASSIFICATION OF TONGUES. 55 branches, of which one marched into Europe, and tho other into Ilindostan; both encountering, in each new countl'y, some populalations of analogous race, and possibly allied, whom they subjugated, and of whom they became the superior caste-tho aristocracy. The two inferior castes of India, the Vaisyas and the Soudras, are but tho descendants of such vanquished nations,-thc anterior type of India's autochthones being even yet represented in a purer state by some of the Dravidian "hill-tribes" above described. But, along~::~ide of this grand and powerful race of Aryas and Iranians, there appears, from the very remotest antiquity, another race, whoso territorial conquests were to be less extended and less durable, but of whom the destinies have been glorious also. It is the Semitic (Shcmitic, Shcmitish) or Syro-Arabian race. ]'rom tho banks of tho Enphratcs to tho shores of the Mediterranean, anJ. to the extremity of the Arabic peninsula, tbis race was cxpan<ling itself. Its great homogeneity springs from tho close bonds whieh combine together tho di{forcnt dialects of its tongue. These dialects arc tho Aramwan, the Heb1·ew, tho Arabic, tho Oltaldwan and tl10 Et!tiopic. By their constitution, all these idioms di slinguiflh themselves sharply from the Indo-European languages. 'l'l1oy possess neither the same grammatical system, nor tho same verbal roots. In Semitic languao-cs, the roots are nearly always di syllabic; or, to speak with philologists, trilitcral, that is to say, formed of three JoLters: and these letters are consonants; because, one of the most distinctive characteristics of tho Semitic tongues is, that tho vowel docs not constitute the fundamental sound in a word. Iloro vowels arc vague, or, to describe them otherwise, they have not any settled :fixed-sound, distinct :U:om the consonant. They become inserted, or rather, they insinuate themselves between strong and rough consonants. Nothing of that law of harmony of tho Ougro-'l'artar or Dravidian tongues, nothing of that sonorousness of Sanscrit, of Greek, and nco-Latin languages, -exists in tho Semitic. Man speaks in them by short words, more or less jerked forth. Tho process of agglutination survives in them still; not, however, completely, as in the Basque. There are many flexions in them, but these iloxions do not constitute the interior of words. Since the publication of M. ERNES'r RENAN's great labors upon the history of Semitic langL1agcs, we arc made perfectly acq uaintcd wi Lh the phases through which these languages have passed. They have had, likewise, their own mould, wbich they have been unable to break, even while modifying themselves. Tho Rabbinical, tho "Nahwco" or literal A1·abic, in aspiring to become languages more analytical than the Ohaldee or tho Ileb1·ew, have remained, not- |
