62 Br Prichard's Anniversary Address 



seventh or eighth century of our era. This fact, according 

 to Mr Hodgson, is as strongly impressed on the rude lan- 

 guages and rude superstitious tenets of the Sub-himalayan 

 tribes, as is their Tibetan origin on their peculiar forms and 

 features. The proof of the affinity of all these tribes is to 

 be found in their languages, of which Mr Hodgson has 

 given a considerable specimen, such as may enable us to form 

 some judgment as to the validity of his conclusions. The 

 same paper contains interesting observations on the physical 

 characters of the several tribes, illustrated by a portrait of 

 Phu-chang, a native of Diparchi, in Utsang or Central Tibet, 

 which is given as a specimen of the Bhotiyan physiognomy. 

 The Tibetans are well known to be a race having the broad- 

 faced Turanian or Tartar (Mongolian) physiognomy. The 

 paper contains some remarks, which are important in a phy- 

 siological point of view, on the permanence of physical types, 

 as well as on the variations which display themselves in these 

 branches of a peculiar race of people who migrated many 

 centuries ago from their original country into one of a dif- 

 ferent climate, and who, therefore, live under different phy- 

 sical conditions from those to which the tribe was long sub- 

 jected, and under the influence of which their brethren beyond 

 the Himalaya continue to exist. 



I must not omit to mention that a new portion of Professor 

 Lassen's great work on Indian history — his " Indische Alter- 

 thumskunde" — has lately appeared from the press at Bonn. 

 In this work the learned author has gone at great length 

 into the questions connected with the ethnology of India, and 

 his book is altogether one of the most instructive and elabo- 

 rate publications connected with the history of that country 

 that has yet appeared. Professor Lassen is well known as a 

 most distinguished oriental scholar, and as one of those men 

 who have with the greatest success devoted themselves to 

 the cultivation of Sanskrit literature. We must always ex- 

 cept the greatest master of the Sanskrit language who has 

 lived since the age of Valmiki, at least among those who are 

 foreign to the lineage of Brahma — I allude, of course, to the 

 Boden Professor. Lassen's principal object seems to be the 

 history of the early periods of India, which have been less 



