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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
Indian, since they had originated in an intermixture of tribes, or since they did not sufficiently follow Indian manners, and especially the system of caste, so roused the common hatred of the Indians that they were reckoned in the same category with the barbarians, and represented as equally hideous of aspect. Accordingly in the epic poems we see all Brahmanical India surrounded by races not at all real, but so imaginary that sometimes it cannot be discovered how the fable originated.
Forms still more wonderful you will find by bestowing a look at the gods of the Indians and their retinue, among whom particularly the attendants of Kuvêra and Kârtikêya are described in such a manner (conf. Mahábh. ix. 2558 et seq). that hardly anything which it is possible for the human imagination to invent seems omitted. These, however, the Indians now sufficiently distinguish from the fabulous races, since they neither believe that they live within the borders of India, nor have any intercourse with the human race. These, therefore, the Greeks could not confound with the races of India.
[APRIL, 1877.
the lower animals as talking to each other have been diffused through almost every country in the world, in a way we cannot understand. Other fables found their way to the Greeks before even the name of India was known to them. In this class some fables even in Homer must be reckoned, a matter which, before the Vedas were better known, admitted only of probable conjecture, but could not be established by unquestionable proofs. We perceive, moreover, that the further the epic poems of the Greeks depart from their original simplicity the more, for that very reason, do those fables creep into them; while a very liberal use of them is made by the poets of a later age. It would be a great mistake to suppose that those fables only in which India is mentioned proceeded from India; for a fable in becoming current carries along with it the name of the locality in which the scene of it is laid. An example will make this clear. The Indians supposed that towards the north, beyond the Himâlaya, dwelt the Uttarakuri, a people who enjoyed a long and happy life, to whom disease and care were unknown, and who revelled in every delight in a land all paradise. This fable made its way to the West, carrying with it the name of the locality to which it related, and so it came to pass that from the time of Hesiod the Greeks supposed that towards the north lived the Hyperboreans, whose very name was fashioned after some likeness to the Indian name. The reason why the Indians placed the seat of this happy people towards the north is manifest; but there was not the slightest reason which can be discovered why the Greeks should have done so. Nay, the locality assigned to the Hyperboreans is not only out of harmony, but in direct conflict, with that conception of the world which the Greeks entertained.
These races, however, might be more readily confounded with other creatures of the Indian imagination, who held a sort of intermediate place between demons and men, and whose number was legion. For the Rakshasas and other Pisach as are said to have the same characteristics as the fabulous races, and the only difference between them is that, while a single (evil) attribute only is ascribed to each race, many or all of these are assigned to the Rakshasas and the Piśâchas. Altogether so slight is the distinction between the two that any strict lines of demarcation can hardly be drawn between them. For the Rakshasas, though described as very terrible beings, are nevertheless believed to be human, and both to live on the earth and take part in Indian battles, so that an ordinary Indian could hardly define how the nature of a Rakshasa differs from that of a man. There is scarcely any one thing found to characterize the Rakshasas which is not attributed to some race or other. Therefore, although the .Greeks might have heard of these by report,which cannot be proved for certain, they could scarcely, by reason of that, have erred in describing the manners of the races according to the Indian conception.
"That reports about these tribes should have reached Greece is not to be wondered at. For fables invented with some glow of poetic fervour have a remarkable facility in gaining a wide currency, which is all the greater in proportion to the boldness displayed in their invention. Those tables also in which the Indians have represented
"The first knowledge of the mythical geography of the Indians dates from this period, when the Greeks were the unconscious recipients of Indian fables. Fresh knowledge was imparted by Skylax, who first gave a description of India; and all writers from the time of Skylax, with not a single exception, mention those fabulous races, but in such a way that they are wont to speak of them as Æthiopians; by doing which they have incurred obloquy and the suspicion of dishonesty, especially K têsias. This writer, however, is not at all untruthful when he says, in the conclusion of his Indika (33), that 'he omits many of these stories, and others still more marvellous, that he may not appear, to such as have not seen these, to be telling what is incredible;' for he could have described many other fabulous races, as for example men with the heads of tigers (vydghramuchás), others with the necks of snakes
