HINDU LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 2,2,$ 



that by much the g r e>:ter proportion of the ships 

 belonging to native merchants, which now enter the 

 straits of Malacca, come from the coast of Coromandcl, 

 and consequently are navigated by persons who speak 

 the languages prevailing in that part; whereas it is 

 evident, that, from the Ttl'mga, or the Tamool, the 

 Malayan has not received any portion of its improve- 

 ment, but from the genuine Ilinduvce of the northern 

 provinces, prior to its debasement by the mixture of 

 Arabic nouns, and the abuse of verbal auxiliaries. If 

 the communication must necessarily be supposed to 

 have its origin, in commerce, 1 should be inclined to 

 consider the people of Guzerat, notwithstanding their 

 distance, as the instructors of the Malays. Their 

 resort to Malacca is particularly noticed by De Bar- 

 ros, and other authentic writers; and it is well 

 known that the Hhulu language has been preserved 

 with more purity in that, than in any other maritime 

 province of India, 



The nature of the affinity suggested, will suffici- 

 ently appear to those who are conversant with the 

 Hindu dialects, by the following examples of Sanscrit 

 words, which are at the same time so familiar to the 

 Malays, and. so thoroughly incorporated into their 

 vernacular tongue, that their foreign origin is never 

 suspected, although the terms adopted from the Avals 

 can, with very few exceptions, be immediately pointed 

 out by the most ordinary scholar. It is true that he is 

 assisted in this discrimination by the peculiarities of 

 the Arabic orthography ; for the Malays, as well as 

 the Persian* and other people, who, in consequence 

 of their conversion to the faith of the Koran, employ 



Qo this 



