1851.] Essay on the Ancient Geography of India, 227 



coming change. Instead of being obliged to proceed backwards and forwards from 

 the deck to his cabin to consult the Mercurial Barometer, he remains on deck with 

 the Aneroid in his hand, and is immediately certified of every atmospheric vari- 

 ation while he is issuing orders to the ship's company. A result more desirable 

 than that which is here supposed, cannot, perhaps, be easily contemplated ; and 

 yet it is one which, it is confidently asserted, the new instrument in question 

 cannot fail to produce." 



It is much to be regretted that this error is now-a-days too common 

 of exalting the imagined or anticipated virtues of an invention so far 

 that the actual results may bring useful instruments into discredit. 

 The Aneroid is, like the first Chronometer, but a first step in instru- 

 ments of that class, and we shall doubtless soon see trials in which 

 mechanical ingenuity will simplify and perhaps overcome many of the 

 present difficulties. I need not add that I have no prejudice, as I can 

 have no possible interest in any way but to serve the cause of the 

 Sailor, who may be too hastily led to pin his faith to the new invention 

 in preference to the Simpiesometer, which is now a standard instru- 

 ment ; and the very defect which it has been charged with, that of 

 being so sensitive that it disquiets a commander of a ship needlessly, 

 is in truth a perfection when its uses are properly understood. 



A Comparative Essay on the Ancient Geography of India. 



[This fragment was written by Col. Wilford about forty years ago, and by him fairly 

 copied, and deposited in the Asiatic Society's Library. It is now published at the 

 request of some members, and in the hope, that, though much has been of late done 

 towards illustrating the Comparative Geography of India, the conjectures, and even 

 the errors and fallacies of such a man as Col. Wilford will not prove uninteresting 

 to the reader. — Ed.] 



The oldest name of India, that we know of, is colar, which pre- 

 vailed till the arrival of the followers of Brahma, and is still preserved 

 by the numerous tribes of Aborigines, living among woods, and moun- 

 tains. These Aborigines are called in the peninsula to this day, coldris 

 and colairs ; and in the north of India coles, coils, and coolies ; thus 

 it seems, that the radical name is cdla. This appellation of colar was 

 not unknown to the ancients ; for the younger Plutarch says, that a 

 certain person called Ganges, was the son of the Indus and of Dio- 

 Pithusa, a Calaurian damsel, who through grief, threw himself into 



2 G 



