ox THE LANGUAGES AND LITERATURE, &C. 159 



late rapid acquisitions in Indian languages and litera- 

 ture, have we obtained any important accessions to 

 our information in this quarter; though both political 

 and literary reasons seem to require them. 



The materials of this imperfect sketch were chiefly 

 collected in the course of a voyage, which llic state 

 of my health caused me to take to the eastern isles, 

 in 1805, during which I resided some time at Pe««w^*, 

 and visted Achi, with some other places on the coast 

 of Sumatra and the Alalayan peninsula. Cultivating 

 an intercourse with a variety of individuals of diffe- 

 rent eastern tribes, I availed myself of the facilities 

 which the situation presented, to correct the vague 

 ideas which I had previously entertained, conceining 

 their lano;uages, literature and the filiation of their 

 tribes. Tiiougli my information was chieHy collected 

 from native sources, yet it sometimes happened, that 

 these were not exactly such as I should have preferred, 

 had better been attainable ; and some times too, from 

 the indilferent state of m\ health and other causes, I 

 was no table to avail myself of these sources of infor- 

 mation to the extent I could have wished. Feeling: 

 myself equally embarrassed by the extent of the sub- 

 ject, the difficulty of the research, and, perhaps I may 

 add, in some instances, by the novelty of the investi- 

 gation, 1 should have hesitated to lay before the 

 Asiatic Society these imperfect results, had I had 

 any immediate prospect of pursuing the diseusssion. 

 I do not however despair of being able, at no very dis- 

 tant period, to ofi^er some more minute and correct 

 views of several of the subjects treated here in a cur- 

 sory manner; and, at all events, I trust this attempt to 

 introduce order and arrangement into a subject at 

 once so extensive and intricate, and to disentangle it 

 from a degree of confusion which seemed almost m- 



