1849. J On the Aborigines of Nor-Eastern India. 451 



On the Aborigines of Nor-Eastern India. By B. H. Hodgson, Esq. 



Pursuant to my plan of furnishing to the readers of the Journal a 

 glance at the Ethnic affinities of the Aborigines of India, from the 

 snows to Cape Comorin, I have now the honor to submit a comparative 

 vocabulary, uniform with its precursors, of the Dhimal, Bodo and Garo 

 tongues, preceded by the written and spoken Tibetan, for a reason that 

 will presently appear. 



I regret that I could not on a recent occasion, nor can now, give the 

 Chepang vocables on this model. But it is many years since I have 

 had access to that secluded people, and I cannot now calculate on hav- 

 ing it again. 



As I have already, in a separate work, given the Dhimal and Bodo 

 languages upon a scale much ampler than the present one, and as I 

 have, moreover, in that work demurred to the sufficiency of summary 

 vocabularies, it may be asked why I repeat, myself, on the present occa- 

 sion, and in the very manner I have myself objected to ? My answer 

 to this question is ready, and I hope will prove satisfactory. Three 

 years have now elapsed since I published the work alluded to, and in 

 that time I have had ample opportunity to observe the general indis- 

 position to enter the field of Indian Ethnology, bent upon serious 

 labour like the author of that work. Now, general co-operation is the 

 one thing needful in this case : and, since I feel certain that there is no 

 want of mental vigour in this land, I am led to ascribe the slackness I 

 have experienced in obtaining co-operators according to the suggested 

 model, to the novelty of the subject, whence it happens that few per- 

 sons can perceive the extensive bearings and high interest of that 

 subject. 



By the present series of summary vocabularies I hope to make these 

 points apparent, when I confidently anticipate that many able men who 

 could not be won to give their time and attention to the elucidation of 

 the barbarous jargon of this or that insulated and petty tribe of abo- 

 rigines, will yet be stimulated to efficient exertion upon being made 

 aware that the question, in fact, relates to the fate and fortunes, the 

 migrations and improvement or deterioration, of the largest family of 

 human kind. No question of ethnology is insulated. It is quite the 

 contrary, and that by its very nature. So that wherever we begin, 



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