ceeded in making these subservient to their social and political ambitions. Nevertheless, the vigilance of modern criticism has detected in the old literature indications of a struggle between the two higher classes for the rights of sacrifice, and the general leadership of the simple but superstitious people. It is even thought that the Kshatrya, or military aristocracy, was so much worsted in these contentions as to be either destroyed or expelled from Hindustan; though it appears more likely that a large number of them settled in Máháráshtrá, Gujarát, and Central India, where they founded the famous Rájput dynasties of those regions, and by intermarriage with the earlier inhabitants gave birth to warlike races of mixed blood. The Brahmans alone of all the Aryan tribes have any claim to have preserved their purity of descent, having been enabled to keep themselves separate by the twofold superiority of religious and social privilege. On the whole, therefore, it may be concluded that the actual conditions of the four-fold division of the Aryans as described in "Manu" was originally rather ideal than actual.

Whatever may have been the frame of their early society, the Aryans soon became too numerous for the limits of the Punjab. Westward the Indus and the mountains held them in, combined with some dread of the populations of those quarters, who appear in the Vedic record as impure Aryans, contact with whom was a pollution. To the South, again, the way was blocked by various obstacles, of which the most formidable would be that great expanse of arid and uninviting sand, which extends from about the 30th parallel of latitude in a southerly direction for nearly four hundred miles to the Runn of Catch. Thus compressed, the migration would naturally take the line of least resistance, namely, the outlet afforded by the rivers trending towards the East. After crossing the Saraswati-which after a short attempt to seek the Indus is now lost in the sand-they would come to the

Jumna and the fertile plains between that river and the Upper Ganges. Here, between the Sutlej and the Ganges, they founded the famous cities of Indrápat and Hastinapur. And here are to be found the legendary scenes of the great epic of the Mahabhárat, and also the fields of real historic battles. After settlement of unknown duration in the MadhyaDes, or "Midland," the Aryans pushed forth fresh branches into Bihar, where Buddhism originated, and whence set forth the expedition to the Deccan already mentioned as forming the subject of the second great epic, the Ramayana. The exact era of these movements is concealed by the mists which hang over all Hindu chronology, save at those rare points where India comes in contact with the history of other countries. We cannot even say whether the migration had any connection with the rise of Buddhism or not. All that can be certainly said is that there was a reformation of religion in Bihár, and that there was a migration from Bihár into the Deccan, but we cannot be sure which took place before the other. There is indeed a presumption that the migration preceded the reform; but it is not a very strong presumption; it rests upon the fact that Sanskrit was originally the language of science and religion among the Dravidians, who did not use the Tamil for those purposes until much later. Hence it may be plausibly argued that they used the language of their instructors as long as the authority of the latter was undisputed, and only fell back on the vernacular when driven to seek popular favour by the rise of controversy. Coming to the time of the Buddhist reform and to the almost immediately succeeding notices af Greek intercourse with India we meet with evidence that demands a somewhat more careful examination.

[Among authorities to be consulted on the subjects dealt with in this chapter are:-"The Imperial Gazetteer of India," 14 vols, Trübner and Co., 1887; "History of India," by M. Elphinstone (Cowell's Notes); the Maps contained in the

"Progress Statement" for 1882-3; Part. II. Hansard, 1885; Muir's "Sanskrit Texts," 3 vols.; "The Laws of Manu," Bühler ("Sacred Books of the East"), 1888; Max Müller's "Essays," passim; Weber's "Indian Literature" (Trübner's "Oriental Series"), 1878; "Altindisches Leben," H. Zimmer, Berlin, 1879; "Der Rigveda, die älteste Literatur des Inder," Leipzic, 1881; "Indo-Aryans," by Rajendradala Mitra, C.I.E, 2 vols, London, 1881. There are two editions of Dr. Muir's book, the latest published 1868-73.]

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CHAPTER II.

PRÆ-MUSLIM TIMES.

Section 1: Rise of Buddhism.-Section 2: India as known to the Greeks.-Section 3: India on the eve of the Muslim conquest.

SECTION 1.-Up to the great religious schism we have-as has been already stated—no historical record in regard to the people in any part of India. The national mind, if such an expression may be permitted, has never shown any aptitude for that branch of letters. Reference has been already made to the ancient scriptural hymns, and to the scarcely less sacred commentaries of sages; and two great epic poems have been mentioned in which real events may be supposed to have afforded a groundwork for imaginative and mythologic embroidery. Of speculation there was no lack; and it can scarcely be doubted that there was a tendency towards many branches of science. But for concrete facts, the dates of events and their successive evolution, the Hindus have never shown the slightest taste or curiosity. Some admixture of possible biography in their poems, and one set of provincial annals,* are all that they have done in that kind during a period of, say, twenty centuries. This peculiarity may have been the result of the very love of speculative philosophy, the taste for abstract reasoning which bred a conviction of the unreality of matter and its appearances. Something, also, may be due to a turn for the marvellous acquired by the conquerors from the ruder

* The "Rájatarangani,”

aborigines amongst whom their lives were led, and to the natural desire to give their own conditions a heroic scale of propor tion. However caused, the scorn of facts and figures is undeniable; and it is likely to keep posterity from all detailed knowledge of the history of the Vedic Aryans. Our information shows them to us as a pastoral people, who also practised agriculture and made war on the aborigines and among themselves. Gradually settling in villages and towns, they built up a kind of cellular social tissue based on the family as a rudimental organ. The family which with them meant a permanent incorporation whose managing partner was the father, while the mother was free, but kept to her particular sphere of labour. The sons also worked for the common good, with some voice in council, some latent claim to separate their respective shares of the joint estate; but ordinarily that estate was probably undivided at first, and the private property of the sons was confined to everything that they might earn without using family capital. The daughters, like their mother, had their prescribed occupation-the name is connected with the milking of cattle*—and were allowed some freedom in the choice of husbands. ogamy was the rule; and when, in certain cases, a second wife could be taken, the original consort remained in the position of "Housewife." When the father became decrepit the eldest son took his place in the management; and when the father died the women came entirely under charge of him who kept the homestead, ordinarily the eldest son. The manes of fathers continued a hypothetic presence, but were not deified; and the performance of certain rites for their spiritual welfare was a necessary part and condition of the administration of the estate. The Deity was regarded as an immanent Power latent in Nature, but capable of representation by one force or

Mon

* Cf. "Dug," and "Dairy." The Aryan languages have the same word for daughter from East to West-Sanskrit, Persian, German, Greek, &c.