1853.] On the Indo-Chinese borderers. 17 



given to some of their clans by the ArakaDese. Mrii is also used 

 by the Arakanese as a generic term for all the hill tribes of their 

 country. The word Khyeng is occasionally used in the same sense. 



5.— Sa'k. 



This is a very small tribe mentioned by Buchanan in his paper 

 " on the religion and literature of the Burmese." Asiatic Researches, 

 Vol. VI. p. 229. He calls them "Thcek," (that being the Burmese 

 pronunciation of the word,) and states that they are " the people 

 inhabiting the Eastern" branch of the Nauf river, and are called by 

 the Bengalis Chatn and " Chatnmas." Chain is no doubt meant for 

 Sdk which is the name, these people now give themselves. Their 

 language is unwritten. 



There are other tribes in Arakan who have languages or dialects 

 peculiar to themselves. They consist of but a few families, and 

 some no doubt are the descendants of captives brought into the 

 country several generations back by the Arakanese, in their warlike 

 expeditions against the adjoining countries. Of these, the language 

 of the tribe called Dding-nah appears to be a rude corrupt dialect 

 of Bengali. The tribe called Mrung state that their ancestors were 

 brought as captives from the Tripiira hills. There is also a curious 

 tribe called Khyau* in the Kuldddn country, consisting of not more 

 than from fifty to sixty families. I have not yet been able to obtain 

 satisfactory vocabularies of the languages of these last named three 

 tribes, but they will be procured on the first opportunity. I regret 



* Kyo aforesaid ? The tradition would ally them with the Kuki and Khyi, 

 whence Kyo, Khyen, Khyi, and Kuki may be conjectured to be radically one and 

 the same term, and to be an opprobrious epithet bestowed by the now dominant 

 races of Indo-China upon the prior races whom they have driven to the wilds, for 

 Khyi, Kyi, Ki, Ku has the wide spread sense of dog. Not one of these tribes is 

 known abroad by its own name. Kami may be readily resolved into " men of the 

 Ka tribe," the Ka being a proper name or merely an emphatic particle. Ka, 

 mutable to Ki and Ku, is a prefix as widely prevalent in the Himalaya and Tibet 

 as the word mi for man. The Kamis themselves understand the word in the latter 

 sense — a very significant circumstance quoad affinities. Ka prefix is interchange- 

 able with Ta, (Ka-va or Ta-va, a bird in Kami, and so in most of these tongues ,) 

 and Ta varies its vowel like Ka ; and thus, in Gyarung, tir-mi, a man, answers 

 Kimi, a man. Ex his disce alia. — B. H. H. 



D 



