ON THE HINDUS. 42t 



" And polish iv'ry with the nicest care : 



" Many retire to rivers shoal, and plunge 



" To seek the beryl flaming in its bed, 



" Or glitt'ring di'mond. Oft the jasper's found 



" Green, but diaphanous ; the topaz too, 



" Of ray serene and pleasing; last of all, 



" The lovely amethyst, in which combine 



*' All the mild shades of purple. The rich soil, 



'* Wash'd by a thousand rivers, from all sides 



u Pours on the natives wealth without controul." 



Their fources of wealth are ftill abundant, even after 

 fo many revolutions and conquefts : in their manu- 

 factures of cotton they ftill furpafs all the world ; and 

 their features have, mod probably, remained unaltered 

 fince the time of Dionyjius : nor can we reafonably 

 doubt, how degenerate and abafed fo ever the Hindus 

 may now appear, that in fome early age they were 

 fplendid in arts and arms, happy in government, wife 

 in legiflation, and eminent in various knowledge : but 

 fince their civil hiftory, beyond the middle of the nine- 

 teenth century from the prefent time, is involved in a 

 cloud of fables, we feem to pofles only four general 

 media of fatisfying our curiofity concerning it; namely, 

 firft, their Languages and Letters; fecondly, their Phi- 

 lojophy and Religion; thirdly, the aclual remains of their 

 old Sculpture and Architecture ; and fourthly, the writ- 

 Jen memorials of their Sciences and Arts. 



I. It is much to be lamented that neither the Greeks, 

 who attended Alexander into India, nor thofe who were 

 long connected with it under the Batlrian Princes, have 

 left us any means of knowing with accuracy, what ver- 

 nacular 



