HOW I KILLED THE TIGER. 39 



great divisions, Arian and Turanian. Mr. Hodg- 

 son asserts that of seven of the southern tongues, 

 five belong to the cultivated class, viz. : Tamil, 

 Malayalam, Telugu, Carnataca, Tulava ; and two 

 belong to the uncultivated class, viz. : Curgi and 

 Todava. With regard to the cultivated tongues 

 of the south, Mr. Elliot observes that the apti- 

 tude of the people at present to substitute prak- 

 ritic words for aboriginal ones is such a stumbling- 

 block in the search for affinities, as to require 

 pains and knowledge to avoid ; and he instances 

 (among others) the common use of the borrowed 

 word rakta for blood, in lieu of the native term 

 nethar, of which latter alone we are enabled to 

 trace the unquestionable ethnic relationship of the 

 Gouds (even those north of the Vindhya) with the 

 remote southerners, speaking Teluga, Canadi, and 

 Tulava. The Himalayan languages form an ex- 

 ception to this assumed general prevalence of the 

 Tamulian type of speech. On the subject of the 

 local limits and mutual influence at the present 

 day of the cultivated languages of the south upon 

 each other, Mr. Elliot remarks that " all the 

 southern dialects become considerably intermixed 

 as they approach eacn other's limits. Thus, the 

 three words for egg used indifferently by the 

 people speaking Canarese (matte, tetti, gadda) are 

 evidently obtained, the first term from the Tamulian, 



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