502 Aborigines of the Nilgiris. [No. 6. 



and, moreover, these niceties are certain to exhibit a great many 

 anomalies, and to be now present, now absent, under circumstances, 

 which, whether the absence were originally caused by impatient 

 rejection, by casual nondevelopment, or by spontaneous or factitious 

 decomposition, must detract greatly from the value and certainty of 

 any inferences founded thereon ; whilst in regard to the more civi- 

 lized tribes, we often positively know and may always prudently 

 suspect that their lingual refinements, when they dhTer from those 

 of the ruder tribes, are so far from being special illustrations of 

 the true norma loquendi of the Tartars that they are exotic and 

 borrowed traits. From this digression (which has reference to 

 Midler's remarks on the relative value of vocabular and grammatical 

 evidence) I return to my subject by giving the following observa- 

 tion of Mr. Metz upon the affinity of the several Nilgirian tongues 

 now before us, merely premising upon the interesting subject of 

 the character and habits of these tribes what Sir James Colvile in 

 his recent visit heard and observed. " They are idle, dirty, intem- 

 perate and unchaste. Polyandry has always existed among them, 

 and their women are now addicted to general prostitution with men 

 of other races, so that they must soon die out, and, in fact I think 

 the population is scanter than it was when T was last here, 

 though so few years back." Upon this, I may remark that the 

 traits observed in the Nilgiris are thoroughly Tartar, and as such 

 are widely prevalent in the Himalaya and Tibet. Even the civilized 

 tribe of the Newars, who, by the way, have a recorded tradition 

 uniting them with the Malabar Nairs — a name identical, they say, 

 with Neyar or Newar (y and w being intercalary letters) were once 

 polyandrists and are still regardless of female chastity, whilst the 

 Tibetans were and are notoriously both. 



Mr. Metz on the subject of the dialectic differences of the Nilgi- 

 rian tongues observes : — 



" The differences of the several languages of the hill tribes con- 

 sist, not so much in idiom as in mere pronunciation. But that is 

 so great that the same or nearly the same word in the mouth of a 

 Toda with his pectoral pronunciation can scarcely be recognized as 

 the same in the mouth of a Kota, with his dental pronunciation. 

 The Badaga and Kurumba dialects are midway between the former 



