The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies Part 8

26, 27. Yarriba, and the Nufi country. In Fernando Po the population is--

28. Ediya. About the Bimbia river and mountain--

29. Isubu.

30, 31, 32. The _Banaka_ (or _Batanga_), the _Panwi_, and the _Mpoongwe_ take us from the Gaboon to Loango; forming a transition from the true Negroes to the Kaffres.

33, 34, 35, 36. _Loango_, _Congo_, _Angola_, and _Benguela_--the Kaffre type, both in form and language, is now more closely approached. Below Benguela there has been little or no exportation.

FOOTNOTES:

[12] "Journal of the Geographical Society," 1850.

[13] "United Service Magazine," Dec., 1850.

[14] "United Service Journal," Nov., 1850.

[15] Daniell in "Transactions of the Ethnological Society."

[16] "United Service Journal," Nov., 1850.

[17] Dr. Daniell on the Natives of Old Calabar, "Transactions of the Ethnological Society."

[18] Rask.--_Vejledning tel Acra-sproget, paa Kysten Ginea, med et Tillaeg om Akvambuisk._--Copenhagen, 1828. _Introduction to the Acra Language, on the Coast of Guinea, with an Appendix on the Akvambu._

[19] "Journal of the American Oriental Society," vol. i. no. 4.

[20] "British Colonies." By M. Martin.

[21] "Journal of the Geographical Society," vol. v. p. 319.

CHAPTER III.

BRITISH COLONIES AND DEPENDENCIES IN ASIA.

ADEN.--THE MONGOLIAN VARIETY.--THE MONOSYLLABIC LANGUAGES.--HONG KONG.--THE TENa.s.sERIM PROVINCES; MAULMEIN, YE, TAVOY, TENa.s.sERIM, THE MERGUI ARCHIPELAGO.--THE MoN, SIAMESE, AVANS, KARIENS, AND SILONG.--ARAKHAN.--MUGS, KHYENS.--CHITTAGONG, TIPPERA, AND SYLHET.--KUKI.--KASIA.--CACHARS.--a.s.sAM.--NAGAS.--SINGPHO.--JILI.-- KHAMTI.--MIs.h.i.+MI.--ABORS AND BOR-ABORS.--DUFLA.--AKA.--MUTTUCKS AND MIRI, AND OTHER TRIBES OF THE VALLEY OF a.s.sAM.--THE GARO.-- CLa.s.sIFICATION.--MR. BROWN'S TABLES.--THE BODO.--DHIMAL.--KOCCH.-- LEPCHAS OF SIKKIM.--RAWAT OF k.u.mAON.--POLYANDRIA.--THE TAMULIAN POPULATIONS.--RAJMAHALI MOUNTAINEERS.--KuLIS, KHONDS, GOANDS, CHENCHWARS.--TUDAS, ETC.--BHILS.--WARALIS.--THE TAMUL, TELINGA, KANARA AND MALAYALAM LANGUAGES.

_Aden._--The ethnology of the Arab stock would fill a volume. It is sufficient to state that the British political dependency of Aden is, ethnologically, an Arab town.

Far more important possessions direct our attention towards India.

Nevertheless, there are certain preliminaries to its ethnology.

Mongolia and China--each of these countries ill.u.s.trates an important ethnological phenomenon.

The first is a physical one. Cheek-bones that project outwards, a broad and flat face, a depressed nose, an oblique eye, a somewhat slanting insertion of the teeth, a scanty beard, an undersized frame, and a tawny or yellow skin, characterize the Mongol of Mongolia.

The second is a philological one. A comparative absence of grammatical inflexions, and a disproportionate preponderance of monosyllabic words, characterize the language of China.

So much for the simple elementary facts; the former of which will be spoken of under the designation of _Mongolian conformation_; the second under that of _monosyllabic language_.

Neither term is limited to the nation by which it has been ill.u.s.trated.

Plenty of populations besides those of Mongolia Proper are Mongol in physiognomy. Plenty of nations besides the Chinese are monosyllabic in language.

All the nations speaking monosyllabic tongues are Mongol in physiognomy; though all the nations which have a Mongol physiognomy do _not_ speak monosyllabic tongues. This makes the latter group, which for shortness will be called that of the _monosyllabic_ nations or tribes--a section, or division, of the former.

Little Tibet, Ladakh, Tibet Proper, Butan, and China, are all Mongol in form, and monosyllabic in language. So are Ava, Pegu, Siam, Cambojia, and Cochin China, the countries which const.i.tute the great peninsula, sometimes called _Indo-Chinese_, and sometimes _Transgangetic_.

The extremity however--the Malayan peninsula--is _not_ monosyllabic.

_The British possessions of Hindostan are monosyllabic on their Tibetan and Burmese frontiers._

_Hong-Kong._--Aden was disposed of briefly. So is Hong-Kong; and that for the same reason. Politically, British, it is ethnologically Chinese.

_Maulmein, Ye, Tavoy, Tena.s.serim, and the Mergui Archipelago._--These const.i.tute what are sometimes called the _ceded_, sometimes the _Tena.s.serim_ provinces. They came into possession of the British at the close of the Burmese war of 1825. Unlike our dependencies in Hindostan, they are cut off from connection with any of the great centres of British power in Asia--in which respect they agree with the smaller and still more isolated settlements of the Malaccan Peninsula. The power that ceded them was the Burmese, so that it is with the existing subjects of that empire that their present limits are in contact; though only for the northern part. To the south they abut upon Siam.

The population throughout is monosyllabic; except so far as it is modified by foreign intermixture--of which by far the most important element is the Indian. Everything in the way of religious creed which is not native and pagan is Indian and Buddhist. The alphabets, too, of the lettered populations are Indian in origin.

The population of the _continental_ part of these British dependencies is referable to four divisions--of unequal and imperfectly ascertained value. 1. The Mon. 2. The Siamese. 3. The Avans. 4. The Kariens.

1. _The Mon._--Mon is the native name of the indigenous population of Pegu, so that the Mon of Maulmein, or Amherst, the most northern of the provinces in question, on the left bank of the lower Salwin, are part and parcel of the present occupants of the delta of the Irawaddi, and the country about Cape Negrais. The Burmese call them _Talieng_, and under that designation they are described in Dr. Helfer's Report.[22]

The Siamese appellation is _Ming-mon_; apparently the native name in a state of composition. In the early Portuguese notices a still more composite form appears--and we hear of the ancient empire of _Kalamenham_, supposed to have been founded by the _Pandalus_ of Mon or Pegu.

None of the _lettered_ languages of the Indo-Chinese peninsula are less known than that of Pegu. At the same time its unequivocally monosyllabic character is beyond doubt. The alphabet is a slight variation of the Avan.

The geographical position of the Mon at the extremity of a promontory, and on the delta of a river, taken along with their philological isolation, is remarkable. They have evidently been encroached upon by the Avans in latter times; whilst, at an earlier period, they themselves probably encroached upon others. Whether they are the oldest occupants of Maulmein is uncertain; it is only certain that they are older than their conquerors.

To the Mon of Pegu the exchange of Avan for British rule, has been a great and an appreciated advantage.

2. _The Siamese._--The native name for the Siamese language is _Tha'y_, and _Tha'y_ is the national and indigenous denomination of the Siamese.

It is the Avans who call them _Sian_ or _Shan_; from whence the European term has been derived through the Portuguese.

The Siamese population is of course greatest on the Siamese frontier; so that, increasing as we go south, it attains its _maximum_ in Tena.s.serim just as the Mon did in Maulmein. It seems, also, to have been introduced at different times; a fact which gives us a distinction between the native Siamese and the recent settlers.

Like the _Mon_, the Tha'y, at least in its more cla.s.sical dialect, is a lettered language; the alphabet, like the Buddhist religion, being Indian. Unlike, however, the _Mon_, which is the only representative of the family to which it belongs, the _Tha'y_ tribes const.i.tute a vast cla.s.s, falling into divisions and subdivisions, and exceedingly remarkable in respect to its geographical distribution.

The Siamese of Siam, the kingdom of which Bankok is the capital, form but a fraction of this great stock. The _upper_ half of the river Menam is occupied by what are called the _Lau_, or _Laos_. These are partly wholly independent, and partly in nominal dependence upon China; and proportionate to their independence is the unlettered character of their language, and the absence of Indian influences. Nor is this all. The Menam is pre-eminently the river of the Tha'y stock, and along the water-system of the Menam its chief branches are to be found; their position being between the Burmese populations of the west, and the Khomen of Cambojia on the east. This distribution is _vertical_, _i.e._, it is characterized by its length, rather than its breadth, and runs from south to north. So far does it reach in this direction that, as high as 28 North lat., in upper a.s.sam we find a branch of it. This is the _Khamti_. In a valuable comparison of languages, well-known as "Brown's Tables,"[23] the proportion of the Khamti words to the South Siamese is ninety-two _per cent._

Of the physical appearance of the Siamese, we find the best account in "Crawfurd's Emba.s.sy," the cla.s.sical work for the ethnology of the southern part of the Indo-Chinese peninsula. Their stature is low; the tallest man out of twenty having been five feet eight inches, the shortest five feet three. The complexion, darker than that of the Chinese, is lighter than that of the Malay; the eye oblique; the jaw square; and the cheek-bones broad.

_Tha'y_ is an ethnological term, and denotes all the nations and tribes akin to the Siamese of the southern, the Khamti of the northern, or the Lau of the intermediate area. The difference between the first and the last of these three should be noticed. Some members of the family are Indianized in religion, and organized in politics. Such are the Siamese of Bankok. Others retain both their independence and their original Paganism. Such are some of the Lau. _Mutatis mutandis_, the same applies to the next family.

This is the _Burmese_, to which both the Avans and the Kariens belong; but as it has been already stated that the divisions under consideration are by no means of equal value, the two branches will be considered separately.