superfluous to adduce proofs on this head from native works; for even the oldest specimens of Hindu sculpture, found in the rock temples, sufficiently attest it. According to the Periplus, precious stones of every kind were brought from the interior to the port of Nelkynda; among these, diamonds and rubies are particularly noticed; and as the former is a native of India, we may reasonably conclude that some of the mines where they are found must have been worked at a very remote period.

The use and manufacture of ornamental works in ivory is equally ancient throughout India. Pendants for the ear, and necklaces, both of that material, form the ordinary decorations of the divinities of Elephanta, as was observed to be the case even in Alexander's time. Above all, the art of working in ivory must have attained a high degree of perfection, from the circumstance, that the ornamental chains above noticed seem to have been carved out of a single piece.

According to the unanimous report both of history and tradition, weaving is reckoned among the most important manufactures of ancient India; a country which nature has abundantly furnished with all kinds of raw material for the purpose, and especially cotton. We are not informed, however, who was the inventor of the simple loom used by the Hindus, which from its first origin does not appear to have undergone any alteration. The variety of cloth fabrics mentioned even by the author of the Periplus, as articles of commerce, is so great, that we can hardly suppose the number to have increased afterwards. We there read of the finest Bengal muslins; of coarse, middle, and fine cloths, either plain or striped; of coarse and fine calicoes; of coloured shawls and sashes; of coarse and fine purple goods, as well as pieces of gold embroidery; of spun silk and furs from Serica. The cotton garments of the Hindus were the first to draw the attention of the Greeks, from the extraordinary whiteness of the cloth; and they are described as being made and worn in the same manner as at the present day. The accounts we find of this cloth in the prophet Ezekiel would lead us to similar conclusions. That the "coloured cloths and rich apparel" brought to Tyre and Babylon from distant countries were partly of Indian manufacture will scarcely be doubted, after what has been already said of the extent of the Phoenician and Babylonian commerce.

Intoxicants; Spices; Perfumery

Of strong and intoxicating liquors, ancient India was acquainted with more than one sort; the use of them, however, was by no means general. The Ramayana distinguishes the Surs, who indulged themselves in these liquors, from the Asurs, who abstained from them; two sects which even at that time must have been of pretty ancient standing, as they are noticed in the old fable about the descendants of Aditi (who are the Surs) and Diti (who are the Asurs).

Under the head of strong liquors, wine is more than once mentioned in the Ramayana. If we suppose this to mean wine made from grapes, it must, in that case, have been imported; because, to the best of our knowledge, they do not press the grape in India itself. It is very doubtful, however, whether this sort of wine is to be understood in the passages alluded to; and even admitting it to have been introduced into the country as early as the time of the Ramayana, it would scarcely be the usual drink of common soldiers, any more than it is at the present day. It appears, indeed, much more probable that palm-wine is intended by the expression; as this could

be easily made in any part of India, and was, moreover, in the time of the Periplus, imported from Arabia, which is the reason of its being called Arabian wine.

The strong liquors, however, in most general use throughout India, appear to have been those obtained by distillation. The Ramayana mentions a beverage of this sort procured from fruits and the sugar-cane; and in Manu we find three principal kinds distinguished, according as the liquors in question were distilled from molasses, bruised rice, or the Madhuca-flower. Of the last we know nothing beyond the mere name; the two former are most likely equivalent to the arrack and rum of modern times. The Brahmans are forbidden the use of all three.

India is the mother country of spices; and we have already shown, in the course of our inquiries into Phoenician commerce, that, from the most ancient times, she supplied the whole Western world with that article. Although in the few native works at our present disposal there is no particular mention made of spices, yet we cannot possibly doubt of their consumption in the country itself. This silence, however, is merely the effect of accidental causes; for neither Manu or the Ramayana had any special occasion of alluding to the subject. But it is quite certain that pepper was very early known to the Western world as an article of commerce; for Theophrastus even distinguishes several varieties of it. Together with the spice itself, the name also of pepper seems to have migrated, probably through Persia, into the countries of the West. There is little doubt that it came originally from the southern parts of Malabar, from Cochin and the neighbourhood; which was noticed for its growth of pepper by Cosmas in the sixth century, and indeed is so at the present day.

With respect to articles of perfumery, we are enabled to speak more decisively. These are of various kinds, partly foreign, as frankincense, and partly indigenous, as the sandal-wood, which is frequently mentioned in the Ramayana and the Gitagovinda, and was in common use throughout India as well as China.

Perfumes in general, and particularly frankincense, were from the most ancient times not confined solely to the purposes of sacrifice; they were also indispensable requisites in Hindu private life, and above all on festal occasions; an example of which will be found in the Ramayana, where the poet describes the solemn entry of Bharata into his grandfather's capital: "The inhabitants, after having watered the streets, had sprinkled them with sand, and garnished them with flower-pots, ranged in order, and containing fragrant plants in full blossom. The city was adorned with garlands, and exhaled the odours of frankincense and sweet-smelling perfumes." The quantity of frankincense consumed in India deserves to be particularly remarked, as it is not an indigenous production, but imported from Arabia. Many other kinds of perfume are mentioned in the Periplus as being of native growth; we can scarcely, therefore, doubt their having been used in very remote antiquity.

This is not the place for enumerating in detail all the objects of commerce mentioned in the earliest accounts of India; such, for instance, as female slaves, destined for the replenishing of harems; different sorts of colours, as lac and indigo; together with base and precious metals; not forgetting the celebrated Indian steel, and many other valuable productions. But enough has been already said for the purpose of showing the extent of ancient Hindu commerce, considered with reference to its principal objects.

Commercial Routes

The nature of the country, however, rendered the internal commerce of India different from that of the rest of Asia, in respect of transportation; for it was not necessary, nor indeed was it always possible, to employ caravans, as in the extensive tracts of inner Asia. That this mode of conveyance was nevertheless occasionally resorted to, we learn from the beautiful episode of Nala, where Damayanti in her flight is represented to have joined a caravan of merchants. But the beasts of burden made use of, in this instance, are tame elephants, which were therefore attacked in the night and dispersed by their wild brethren of the forest; and besides, the caravan in question appears to have belonged to some royal personage, rather than to a company of private merchants. The greatest part of India, that is to say, the whole of the peninsula, being traversed with rocky mountains, would scarcely, if at all, admit of the employment of camels; and the moderate distances between one town and another, and the general spread of civilisation, would enable merchants to travel alone with perfect security, while river navigation and the coasting trade afforded unusual facilities for transporting merchandise.

The Ganges and its tributary streams were the grand commercial routes of northern India; and mention is also made of navigation on the rivers of the peninsula in the south. It is not improbable, indeed, that artificial routes between the Ganges and the Indus, as we find to have been the case in aftertimes, existed even at an earlier period. The great high-roads across the country are not only frequently mentioned in the Ramayana; but we also read of a particular class of men who were commissioned to keep them in repair. According to Arrian, the commercial intercourse between the eastern and western coasts was carried on in country-built vessels; and when we consider the high antiquity of the pearl-fisheries in the straits of Ceylon, together with the necessary requisites thereto, we can hardly doubt that such was also the case many hundred years before his time. It would appear, then, that conveyance of merchandise by means of a caravan, as in other countries of the East, continued always foreign to the practice of India, unless the multitudes of pilgrims and penitents, that were continually resorting to places of sanctity, may be said to have compensated for the want of it. The almost innumerable crowds that yearly flock to Benares, Jagannath, and elsewhere, amounting to many hundred thousands of souls, would obviously give rise to a species of commerce united with devotion; and markets and fairs would be a natural, and indeed an indispensable requisite to satisfy the wants of such throngs of people. And consequently, too, the establishments called choultries, the erection of which was considered a religious duty, and whose forms not unfrequently displayed all the magnificence of native architecture, might be said to have a similar destination with the caravanseries of other Eastern countries, without, however, the resemblance between the two being exactly perfect.

The nature of the country and its productions, together with the peculiar genius of the people themselves, both contributed to render Hindu commerce of a passive rather than an active character. For as the productions of India were always in high request with the Western world, the Hindus would clearly have no occasion to transport them to foreign countries themselves; they would of course expect the inhabitants of the latter to come and fetch what they wanted. And again, the Hindu national character has no pretensions to that hardy spirit of adventure, which is capable of achieving

the most extraordinary undertakings. While their fables abound with prodigious enterprise, the people themselves are content to lead a quiet and peaceful life, with just so much activity as is requisite to guide the plough or direct the shuttle, without running the risk of hazardous and unnecessary adventure. Their India-their Jambu-dvipa, comprised in their estimation the limits of the known world. Separated from the rest of Asia by a chain of impassable mountains on the north; while on all other sides the ocean formed a barrier, which, if their laws are silent on the subject, yet at least their habits or their customs would not permit them to transgress; we can find no certain proof that the Hindus were ever mariners.b

IN the vast highlands formed by the conjunction of the great mountain chains of Bolor-Tagh in the northwest of the Himalayas, where, not far from the sources of the Oxus and other great rivers the tableland of Pamir, "the roof of the world," extends, a well-built nomadic race, possessing the rudiments of civilisation and calling themselves the "excellent" Aryans, in prehistoric times pastured their horses and flocks. Shut off on the north and east by impassable mountains from Central Asia, the country on the west and south was appointed them for the evolution of their natural capacities. When the Aryans, following the inborn wandering instinct of all pastoral races, left their home, one part of them settled in the mountain districts north and west of the Hindu Kush (Paropamisus), which in the Greek writers bore the names of Sogdiana, Bactriana, Hyrcania, and Arachosia; another part went farther, wandered through the southwestern passes of these mountains, and took possession of the rich, fertile country on the banks of the Indus (Sindh). The former, called the Iranians, or according to their sacred language, the Zend people, evolved in time the state of culture which their conquerors-the Medes and Persians-adopted from them. The latter, called among the other nations of the ancient world, Indians or Hindus, after the principal river of their land, became the creators of that perfected system of religion, of those peculiar political and legal forms, and of that Sanskrit literature, which we still admire in its remains and traditions.

The aborigines, dark-skinned races, of rude customs and wild mode of life, were partly exterminated or pushed back into the forests by the Aryan immigrants, partly subjugated and reduced to the condition of servitude and slavery, and in this way an impassable barrier was erected between the two races.

The deep contempt with which the conquerors looked down upon the conquered increased in the Indian consciousness that self-satisfied conceit which led the Brahmans to consider all people who spoke another language, or who were under other laws, as barbarians, called by them Mlechcha (i.e., weak), with whom they must avoid all intermixture and all social inter

course.