The Ethnology of India. 23 



in the papers with which I have been favoured from Bombay, I find 

 that Major Keatinge, describing the three tribes of Gonds, Koors, and 

 Bheels who meet about Asseerghur, says, " All three tribes are very 

 black, with a decidedly African expression when met in the centres of 

 their country." And Capt. Probyn, speaking of the more civilised 

 Gonds who are now, he says, finer and fairer, still adds, " with some- 

 what African features." Major Keatinge adds what illustrates that 

 which I have already said, " On the outskirts of their country, their 

 features are much modified, showing plainly that they do not succeed 

 in keeping their blood pure. The Chiefs have generally made it a 

 point to get women of other castes into their households, and I have 

 consequently observed that none of them have the national features." 



In the South, the Chermara of Malabar are described as " very di- 

 minutive, with a very black complexion, with not unfrerpiently woolly 

 hair." And of some of the tribes of the Kodaghcrry hills it is said that 

 11 flattened noses, dark complexion and large white teeth filed into the 

 form of a saw give them an African appearance." The Nagadces are 

 said to be " in complexion invariably of the deepest black, their hair 

 thick and curly, their features brutish, their forms diminutive." 

 That the type which I have described prevailed among the Aborigines 

 generally in ancient times, is evident from the Purans, where they 

 are described in extremely uncomplimentary terms as l vile monsters/ 

 1 allied to monkeys,' ' as black as crows,' ' of flattened features and of 

 dwarfish stature.' Their long thick matted hair is also particularly 

 mentioned. 



The ancient Greeks also describe the South-Indians as like Ethio- 

 pians, and it is difficult to assign any other country to the Oriental 

 Ethiopians of Herodotus. 



It may be stated, as a physical peculiarity of the Aboriginal tribes, 

 that most of them seem to have a remarkable power of resisting 

 malaria, and thrive in the most malarious jungles where no other 

 human beings can live. This may, however, be the result of long 

 habit ; some tribes inhabiting healthy localities sicken easily enough 

 elsewhere. 



The languages of the Aborigines seem to haye all this much in 

 common, that they are of the structure described as Turanian. They 

 are neither like the Monosyllabic Chinese on the one hand, nor on the 



