142 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



by their own industry. Mat tents, bark and skin 

 huts, belong to a third class ; and all are, or have been 

 cannibals ; but this appears to be a condition of exis- 

 tence, which, at some time or other, was a habit in the 

 highest and noblest races ; for human sacrifices are 

 always the last symptom of the expiring custom. * 



To the east of the Indus, we find the primeval nations 

 of India, sometimes typified, in mythological poems, by 

 Hanuman and his monkey followers ; but historically 

 shown to designate certain human tribes, since the 

 lianas of Odeypoor, heads of the Sesodya tribe, noblest 

 of the Rajpoots, claims to be descended from the monkey 

 god, which they pretend to prove, by a peculiarly elon- 

 gated structure of the coccyx in their family. The 

 fclaim establishes much more clearly, that the Bheels 

 of this region, primeval inhabitants, and still the most 

 numerous portion of the population, were the chief 

 means of conquest in the wars of Lankadwipe or 

 Ceylon ; although they had many wars with their more 

 western conquerors. The nation is further mixed up 

 with Brahminical mythology ; for Bhil, the chief god 

 of these foresters, slew Heri, one of the Pandoo family. 

 Bheel likewise shot Chrishna with an arrow ; and the 

 Kabandaz of the same primeval stock are related to 

 have captured Rama. These, with many others, ex- 

 tending to beyond the Brahmaputra, may be considered 

 as the physical Nagas of Sanscrit lore ; that name 



* The Mexican sovereigns, in the time of Cortez, were 

 still obliged, by law, to taste human flesh once in the year. 

 The Goands do the same as a religious behest. 



