328 



THE SINGHALESE CHRONICLES. 



[PART in. 



But the greater probability is, that a branch of the 

 same stock that originally colonised the Dekkan 

 extended its migrations to Ceylon. All the records and 

 traditions of the peninsula point to a time when its 

 nations were not Hindu ; and in numerous localities \ 

 in the forests and mountains of the peninsula, there are 

 still to be found the remnants of tribes who undoubtedly 

 represent the aboriginal race. The early inhabitants 

 of India before their comparative civilisation under 

 the influence of the Aryan invaders, like the abori- 

 gines of Ceylon before the arrival of then: Bengal 

 conquerors, are described as mountaineers and 

 foresters who were " rakshas " or demon worshippers ; 

 a religion, the traces of which are to be found 

 to the present day amongst the hill tribes in the 

 Concan and Canara, as well as in Guzerat and Cutch. 

 In addition to other evidences of the community of 

 origin of these continental tribes and the first in- 

 habitants of Ceylon, there is a manifest identity, 

 not alone in their popular superstitions at a very 

 early period, but in the structure of the national 

 dialects, which are still prevalent both in Ceylon and 

 Southern India. Singhalese, as it is spoken at the 

 present day, and, still more strikingly, as it exists as 

 a written language in the literature of the island, 

 presents unequivocal proofs of an affinity with the 

 group of languages still in use in the Dekkan ; Tamil, 

 Telingu, and Malayahm. But with these its iden- 

 tification is dependent on analogy rather than on 

 structure, and all existing evidence goes to show that 

 the period at which a vernacular dialect could have been 

 common to the two countries must have been extremely 

 remote. 2 



nese in the south of Ceylon, but they 

 refer the event to a period subse- 

 quent to the seizure of the Singha- 

 lese king and his deportation to 

 China in the fifteenth century. DE 

 BARROS, Dec. iii. ch. i. ; DE COTJTO, 

 Dec. v. ch. 5. 



' L \SSE:N, Indischc 'Alt 'erthwnskunde, 

 vol. i. p. 199, 362. 



2 The Mahawanso (ch. xiv.) attests 

 that at the period of Wijayo's con- 

 quest of Ceylon, B.C. 543,* the lan- 

 guage of the natives was different 

 from that spoken by himself and his 



