176 REPORT—1850. 
laya chain, giving rise to the Ganges and to the Bramapitra river, and which 
are denominated Bhatia. Of these Dr. Bird remarks, the connexion of this 
race with the Nomadic Tartar tribes possessing the central region of Upper 
Asia may perhaps account for that mixture of Sabeism which prevails in the 
religious worship of the Gonds, and is characteristic of the superstitious 
system of belief existing among the Mongolian tribes. Mr. Bradley, who has 
taken some pains on this subject, traces also a close connexion between the lan- 
guage of the Gonds and that of the Burmas, called by Mr. Marsden Oraug 
benouas, signifying literally the aboriginesof the Malayan or Malacea peninsula. 
The result of all my inquiries on the several aboriginal tribes of India 
leads me to the following conclusions :—First, that they are of a stock essen- 
tially differing in almost every character of a race from the Caucasian Hindu. 
That the whole have a common origin; and though they may have come, as 
they probably did at different times, both from the east and from the north, 
they are all derived from the same great Tartar horde, and undoubtedly in- 
habited India anterior to the invasion of that ancient and venerable people 
the Hindis. The latter, proceeding eastward from Persia, extended over the 
barbarous nations of India, and introduced their laws, their civil institutions, 
and their language, at the same time enslaving the aborigines wherever they 
settled. The exclusive rales of caste forbade the intermixture of the two 
races, and this circumstance alone suffices to account for the separation 
having continued to exist for so lengthened a period. 
While the Hindu branch of the Caucasian family proceeded eastward, 
other portions of the same race spread themselves westward and became the 
progenitors of the present European race. They subjected those they sub- 
dued to the yoke of slavery as serfs of the soil; they brought with them the 
Sanscrit or Indo-Germanic tongue, and to them Europe owes the introduction 
of that system of municipal administration which is the only true foundation 
of free institutions and constitutional government. 
Report concerning the Observatory of the British Association at Kew, 
from Sepiember 12, 1849 to July 31,1850. By Francis Ronaxps, 
Esq., F.R.S., Honorary Superintendent. 
Ar the conclusion of my last Report (for 1848-49), various proposals were 
made for the prosecution of new experiments and observations, and for the 
continuance of others already instituted at Kew: and the General Committee 
of the British Association, at the Birmingham meeting in September 1849, 
resolved that “Sir John Herschel having reported that the Meteorological 
Observations made at Kew are peculiarly valuable, and likely to produce the 
most important results, the sum of £250 be voted for the continuance of that 
establishment for the ensuing year,” &c.* ae 
Endeavours have accordingly been made, not only to cause this sum, added 
to about £50, the residue of the former year’s grant, to go as far as possible 
toward the attainment of the principal objects contemplated, but, at the same 
time, to promote the views of Her Majesty’s Government in the establishment 
of a convenient and exact system of self-registering magnetical and other 
meteorological instruments in the colonial observatories under the superin- 
tendence of our highly distinguished Honorary Secretary Colonel Sabine, 
* Vide Report for 1849, p. xx. The odservations here alluded to were principally those 
on atmospheric electricity. 
