DESCRIPTIONS OF NATURE BY THE ARIAN RACES. 49 



only of organic, but of inanimate nature ; of the transition 

 from drought to tropical rain ; of the appearance of the first 

 cloud on the deep azure of the pure sky, when the long-desired 

 Etesian winds are first heard to rustle amid the feathery foli- 

 age of the lofty palms. 



The present would appear a fitting place to enter somewhat 

 further into the domain of Indian delineations of nature. " If 

 we suppose," writes Lassen, in his admirable work on Indian 

 antiquity,* " that a part of the Arian race emigrated to India 

 from their native region in the northwestern portion of the 

 continent, they would have found themselves surrounded by a 

 wholly unknown and marvolously luxuriant vegetation. The 

 mildness of the climate, the fruitfulness of the soil, and its 

 rich and spontaneous products, must have imparted a brighter 

 coloring to the new life opened before them. Owing to the 

 originally noble characteristics of the Arian race, and the pos- 

 session of superior mental endowments, in which lay the germ 

 of all the nobleness and greatness to which the Indians have 

 attained, the aspect of extern il nature gave rise in the minds 

 of these nations to a deep meditation on the forces of nature, 

 which has proved the means of inducing that contemplative 

 tendency which we find so intimately interwoven in the most 

 ancient poetry of the Indians. The all-powerful impression 

 thus produced on the minds of the people is most clearly 

 manifested in the fundamental dogma of their belief — the rec- 

 ognition of the divine in nature. The freedom from care, 

 and the- ease of supporting existence in such a climate, were 

 also conducive to the same contemplative tendency. Who 

 could devote themselves with less hinderance to a profound 

 meditation of earthly life, of the condition of man after death, 

 and of the divine essence, than the anchorites, dwelling amid 

 forests,! the Brahmins of India, whose ancient schools consti- 



* Lassen, Ind. Alterthumskunde, bd.i., s. 412-415. 



t Respecting the Indian forest-hermits, Vanaprestiae (Sylvicolse) and 

 Sramdni (a name which has been altered into Sarmani and Germani), 

 see Lassen, " de nominibus quibus veteribus appellantur Indorum pki- 

 losophi" in the Rhein. Museum fur PhUologie, 1833, s. 178-180. Wil- 

 helm Grimm recognizes something of Indian coloring in the description 

 of the magic forest by a priest named Lambrecht, in the Song of Alex- 

 ander, composed more than 1200 years ago, in immediate imitation of 

 a French original. The hero comes to a wonderful wood, where 

 maidens, adorned with supernatural charms, spring from lar^e flowers. 

 He remains so long with them that both flowers and maidens lade awajr. 

 (Compare Gervinus, bd. i., s. 282, and Massmann's Denkmdler, bd. i., 

 B. 16.) These are the same as the maidens of Edrisi's Eastern magic 

 bland of Vacvac, called in the Latin version of the Masudi Chothbeddin^ 

 Vol. II.— C 



