202 



ON THE ANCIENT 



by Ramses II., the Sesostris of the Greek. Nevertheless, we 

 may safely surmise, even if there were no evidence forth- 

 coming, that in those days, a brisk commerce united the 

 different and distant nations. In the tombs dating from 

 the time of the 18th dynasty, which ended in 1462 B.C., 

 there are said to have been found mummies wrapt up in 

 Indian muslins and containing vases of Chinese porcelain. 

 Moreover the old Egyptians used indigo for dyeing purposes, 

 and this vegetable produce can be obtained only from India. 



The antiquity of this traffic leads us therefore back to a 

 period, when the Aryans had scarcely made any progress in 

 the occupation of India. Many customs and manners which 

 old and modern non- Aryan inhabitants have in common 

 with the ancient nations of Arabia and India must be ascribed 

 as much to the affinity and relationship of those nations as to 

 the consequences of mutual intercourse. Thus the polyandry 

 which prevailed formerly in Arabia, as it still does in Malabar, 

 among the Nairs, was an institution common to the Kushite 

 tribes. The system of caste, is originally not peculiar either 

 to Semitic or to Aryan races. The division of a popu- 

 lation according to profession, art and trade, which often 

 coincides with racial differences, is a natural result of social 

 life. These distinctions appear to have assumed in Egypt 

 at first a certain definite form, and to have developed into 

 the system of Caste. Access to caste though was in Egypt 

 not debarred to outsiders, for sons of priests could become 

 warriors, and those of warriors could become priests, &c. It 

 is a fact worthy of notice, that Southern India, where Kushite 

 and Dravidian races preponderate, is also the stronghold of 

 the institution of caste. Even the legal Hindu prescriptions 

 about caste, which is now viewed as a religious regulation, 

 especially through the priestly ascendancy of the Brahmans, 

 are notwithstanding their comparative antiquity, young when 

 compared with Kushite institutions. When the knowledge 

 about Indian science was in Europe still in its infancy, there 



