36 
ON THE ORIGINAL INHABITANTS 
It miglit appear that when so many changes are possible, 
no reliance can be placed on such evidence, but these permu- 
tations do not all take place at the same time, indeed dialecti- 
cal pronunciation selects some letters in preference to others. 
The northern Hindu pronounces, a B, where the southern 
prefers a F", and both letters occur only in border districts ; 
thus no B is found in the names of such places situated in 
the Chingleput, South- Arcot, Tanjore, Trichinopoly, Madura, 
Tinnevelly, and Malabar districts, while in South-Kanara, 
Ganjam and Mysore a Fis seldom used. 
These few preliminary philological remarks are absolutely 
necessary to facilitate the understanding of the subsequent 
discussion. The important position which language occupies 
in such a research as the present was well pointed out more 
than forty years ago, by the Pioneer of North-Indian Ethno- 
logy, the learned B. H. Hodgson, when he wrote in the 
preface to his first Essay : " And the more I see of these 
primitive races the stronger becomes my conviction that 
there is no medium of investigation yielding such copious 
and accurate data as their languages." 
Historical Remarks. 
Turning from these linguistic to historical topics, we 
know as a fact that when tracing the records of any nation or 
country as far back as possible, we arrive at a period when 
all authentic or provable accounts cease. "We have then 
reached the prehistoric stage. What occurred during that 
epoch can never be verified. When the mist of historic 
darkness disappears from the plains and mountains of a 
country^ the existing inhabitants and their dwellings become 
bridge after a gentleman of that name. The word Samilton, being difficult 
to pronounce in Tamil, was changed into amattan (common form for ampat- 
tan) which means in Tamil a barber, whence by retranslation into EugUsh 
the bridge was allied Barber's bridge. 
