106 GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE and inviolable precepts. Singular as is the frame of society among the Hindus, there can be no doubt but those who have impressed the public with these opinions have rather consulted the assertions of the Bramins than the principles of human nature and the analogy of history. Such opinions will not bear the slightest examination. Hindustan itself con- tains ten different nations, all professing the Hindu religion ; and the many ages before such a revolu- tion could have been completed, implies most ex- tensive conversion and proselytism. Actual emi- gration, among Hindus, is proved by the existence of Hindu colonies on the shores of the Caspian, and by the abundant and unquestionable relics of Hindu manners, language, and religion in almost every country of Eastern Asia. ^" This, indeed, is a point now too firmly established to demand any ad- ditional evidence. Having premised these neces- sary observations, we shall be the better enabled to understand and explain the fact, still sufficiently curious and interesting, of the existence of San- skrit in all the improved languages of the Archi- pelago. There are five circumstances respecting the existence of Sanskrit in the dialects of the Ar- chipelago which may be looked upon as established, and from an attention to which we shall be enabled
- A small Hindu colony exists at present at Malacca, and
has existed there for ages. The original settlers were from Telinga.
