Page:Comparative grammar of the languages of further India.djvu/150

136 more or less reliable, of their first settlement in that locality and of the tribes they encountered in their migration, make no mention of the Mons or Talains, until some time after their arrival there, as they pushed southward below the present city of Prome.

According to the Chinese annals the countries of Anam and Tonquin, when conquered by them two hundred and fourteen years before the Christian era, were occupied by the same races as at present. If a sufficiently close connection between the Mons and the nations east of them (excluding the intrusive Siamese) can be established, as Logan presumed, we may be warranted in regarding the whole group as forming the first great wave of emigration that swept over this region.

When we endeavour to trace their route, or the date of their wanderings, we are left entirely to conjecture, or to such external evidence as we can collect. We have not even the slight assistance offered by the dim traditions of most savage tribes. The probability is that they came from the westward, and at an early date sojourned for some time in the Gangetic valley.

It is now acknowledged that prior to the irruption of the Aryans into India from the west across the Indus, the valley of the Ganges was occupied by various races of Turanian origin. Without venturing on the question of the relation between these, it is clear that the Aryan authors of the Mahábhárata distinguish two races with which the Aryans came in contact: