present the mountains of Himálaya as lying to the north, and, to the weft, those of Vindhya, called alfo Vindian by the Greeks; beyond which the Sindhu runs in feveral branches to the sea, and meets it nearly oppofite to the point of Dwáracà, the celebrated feat of their Shepherd God: in the fouth-east they place the great river Saravatya; by which they probably mean that of Ava, called also Airávati in part of its course, and giving perhaps its ancient name to the gulf of Sabara. This domain of Bharat they confider as the middle of the Jambudwipa, which the Tibetians alfo call the Land of Zambu; and the appellation is extremely remarkable; for Jambu is the Sanfcrit name of a delicate fruit called Fáman by the Mufelmans, and by us rofeapple; but the largest and richest fort is named Amrita, or Immortal; and the Mythologists of Tibet apply the fame word to a celestial tree bearing ambrofial fruit, and adjoining to four vaft rocks, from which as many facred rivers derive their several ftreams.

The inhabitants of this extenfive tract are defcribed by Mr. LORD with great exactness, and with a picturesque elegance peculiar to our ancient language: "A people, fays he, prefented "themselves to mine eyes, clothed in linen gar"ments fomewhat low defcending, of a gefture "and garb, as I may fay, maidenly and well

nigh effeminate, of a countenance shy and "somewhat estranged, yet fmiling out a glozed "and bashful familiarity." Mr. ORME, the Historian of India, who unites an exquisite taste for every fine art with an accurate knowledge of Afiatick manners, obferves, in his elegant preliminary Differtation, that this "

country has "been inhabited from the earlieft antiquity by

parts

the

a people, who have no resemblance, either in "their figure or manners, with any of the na"tions contiguous to them," and that," although conquerors have established themselves at dif"ferent times in different of India, yet "original inhabitants have loft very little of "their original character." The ancients, in fact, give a description of them, which our early travellers confirmed, and our own perfonal knowledge of them nearly verifies; as you will perceive from a paffage in the Geographical Poem of DIONYSIUS, which the Analyst of Ancient Mythology has tranflated with great spirit ;

"To th' east a lovely country wide extends,
"INDIA, whofe borders the wide ocean bounds;
"On this the fun, new rifing from the main,
"Smiles pleas'd, and sheds his early orient beam.
"Th' inhabitants are fwart, and in their locks

"Betray the tints of the dark hyacinth.
"Various their functions; fome the rock explore,
"And from the mine extract the latent gold;

"Some labour at the woof with cunning skill,

." And manufacture linen; others shape
"And polish iv'ry with the nicest care;
"Many retire to rivers fhoal, and plunge
"To seek the beryl flaming in its bed,
"Or glitt❜ring diamond. Oft the jafper's found
"Green, but diaphanous; the topaz too
"Of ray ferene and pleafing; laft of all
"The lovely amethyst, in which combine
"All the mild fhades of purple. The rich foil,
"Wafh'd by a thousand rivers, from all fides
"Pours on the natives wealth without control."

Their fources of wealth are ftill abundant even after so many revolutions and conquests; in their manufactures of cotton they still surpass all the world; and their features have, most probably, remained unaltered fince the time of DIONYSIUS; nor can we reasonably doubt, how degenerate and abased so ever the Hindus may now appear, that in fome early age they were fplendid in arts and arms, happy in government, wise in legislation, and eminent in various knowledge: but, fince their civil history beyond the middle of the nineteenth century from the prefent time, is involved in a cloud of fables, we seem to poffefs only four general media of fatisfying our curiofity concerning it; namely, first, their Languages and Letters; secondly, their Philofophy and Religion; thirdly, the actual remains of their old Sculpture and Architecture; and fourthly, the written memorials of their Sciences and Arts.

I. It is much to be lamented, that neither the Greeks, who attended ALEXANDER into India, nor those who were long connected with it under the Bactrian Princes, have left us any means of knowing with accuracy, what vernacular languages they found on their arrival in this Empire. The Mohammedans, we know, heard the people of proper Hindustan, or India on a limited scale, speaking a Bháfá, or living tongue of a very fingular conftruction, the purest dialect of which was current in the districts round Agrà, and chiefly on the poetical ground of Mať'burà; and this is commonly called the idiom of Vraja. Five words in fix, perhaps, of this language were derived from the Sanscrit, in which books of religion and science were composed, and which appears to have been formed by an exquifite grammatical arrangement, as the name itself implies, from fome unpolished idiom; but the basis of the Hinduftáni, particularly the inflexions and regimen of verbs, differed as widely from both those tongues, as Arabick differs from Perfian, or German from Greek. Now the general effect of conqueft is to leave the current language of the conquered people unchanged, or very little altered, in its groundwork, but to blend with it a confiderable number of exotick names both for things and for actions; as it has happened in every country, that I can

recollect, where the conquerors have not preserved their own tongue unmixed with that of the natives, like the Turks in Greece, and the Saxons in Britain; and this analogy might induce us to believe, that the pure Hindì, whether of Tartarian or Chaldean origin, was primeval in Upper India, into which the Sanscrit was introduced by conquerors from other kingdoms in fome very remote age; for we cannot doubt that the language of the Veda's was used in the great extent of country, which has before been delineated, as long as the religion of Brahmà has prevailed in it.

The Sanfcrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful ftructure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquifitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a ftronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and in the forms of grammar, than could poffibly have been produced by accident; fo ftrong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from fome common fource, which, perhaps, no longer exifts: there is a fimilar reafon, though not quite so forcible, for + fuppofing that both the Gothick and the Celtick,

though blended with a very different idiom, had the fame origin with the Sanfcrit; and the old Persian might be added to the fame family, if