294 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



national disasters were at hand, corresponding to the 

 same doctrine anciently believed in the western parts 

 of the present Hanoverian dominions ; while both re- 

 call to mind the celebrated Indian mountain peak of 

 Gho-Karma (the moaning cow), which, if it have a geo- 

 graphical position at all, must be the same as the seat 

 of Mahadeo, at the source of the Ganges, also known by 

 the name of Himavahn. These and other Finnic and 

 oriental elements, known to exist in the Basque as it is 

 now spoken, justify the claim we make of that ancient 

 race as originally appertaining to the intermediate stem 

 now under consideration, more particularly as among 

 the present inhabitants of France, there are still extant 

 the wrecks of tribes (the Cagots), which, from the first 

 Celtic invasion to the present time, have never been 

 acknowledged to form a portion of any, though the 

 vulgar is willing to believe they are a residue of Arian 

 Goths : which opinion, even if it were correct, would 

 not much remove them from a Finnic origin. 



We may associate with these also the human ossu- 

 aries in the caverns of Breigne, in the vicinity of the 

 river Lot in Quercy, described in a former article ; 

 for they indicate a mode of disposing of the dead gene- 

 rally more careful than the Celtic ; and from the more 

 common absence of the skulls, and the regular packing 

 of the extremities in layers, an argument may be drawn 

 to show, that they are second and final deposits of the 

 departed of a race, whose first mode of preserving them 

 was to have the bodies sewed up in skins, hung up for 

 a given period in trees, and then buried, often with a 



