XIV.] THE CAUCASIC PEOPLES. 557 



Homo europceus and H. alpinus, as they may now he called who 

 have been in the closest contact for thousands of years all along 

 the borderlands from the heart of Asia to the shores of the 

 Atlantic. 



But the eventful drama is not yet closed. Arrested perhaps 

 for a time by the barrier of the Hindu-Kush and Suliman ranges, 

 these wonderful proto-Aryan conquerors burst at Ethnic Re _ 

 last, probably through the Kabul river gorges, on lations in 

 to the plains of India, and thereby added another 

 world to the Caucasic domain. Here they were brought face 

 to face with new conditions, which gave rise to fresh changes and 

 adaptations resulting in the present ethnical relations in the 

 peninsula. There is good reason to think that in this region the 

 leavening Aryan element never was numerous, while even on their 

 first arrival the Aryan invaders found the land already somewhat 

 thickly peopled by the aborigines. 



These formed at least three, and most probably four distinct 

 ethnical groups a black substratum forming a section of the 

 primitive Indo-Malaysian populations; tribes of Kolarian speech 

 probably from the north-east, or from the Himalayan slopes ; tribes 

 of Dravidian speech almost certainly from the north-west through 

 the Suliman passes ; lastly, Mongoloid peoples from the Tibetan 

 plateau, all arriving apparently in the order named. Of the cha- 

 racteristic woolly hair, by which the first might best be recognised, 

 few distinct traces have yet been detected ; nor are the features 

 anywhere sufficiently negroid to remove all doubts as to their 

 presence 1 . Hence we may perhaps infer that little remains of 

 this substratum except a general deepening of the colour of the 

 skin, if it is to be traced to this source rather than to environ- 

 mental influences. 



The fourth or Mongoloid element has also mainly disappeared 

 from India proper, and is found now only on the northern and 

 north-eastern uplands near their original Tibetan homes, beyond 



1 Negroid or Negrito traits are however shown in the nose, mouth, and hair 

 of the Paniyan woman figured in the Madras Govt. Museum Series, vol. 1 1. 

 No. i, Madras, 1897, p. 25. 



