nswer, when any one was questioned about a future
state. Too vague for monotheism, the Silong creed is also said to be too
vague for idolatry, too vague for sacrifices.

The Kariens, also, believe in _Nat_, but, as _they_ believe in their
influence on human affairs, they sacrifice to them accordingly.

Little, then, as we know, respecting these two families, we know that
the common practice of _Nat_ worship connects them; and this worship
connects many other members of the _Burmese_ stock. Consequently it
helps us to place the Silong in that group. It also favours the notion
of the Tenasserim aborigines being Burmese.

It is the delta of the Irawaddi which isolates the _Tenasserim
provinces_; and the British dependency from which it separates them is--

_Arakhan._--We are prepared for the ethnological position of the Arakhan
populations. They are _Burmese_.

We are likewise prepared for a division of them; there will be the
Indianized and the Pagan--paganism and political independence going, to
a certain degree, together.

We are prepared for even minuter detail; the paganism will be
Nat-worship; the Indian creed Buddhism: the alphabet also, where the
language is written, will be Indian also. In Captain Tower's
vocabulary,[26] only seven words out of fifty differ between the Burmese
of Arakhan, and the Burmese of Ava; and some of these are mere
differences of pronunciation.

The language itself is called _Rukheng_ by those who use it; but the
Bengali name is _Mug_.

This applies to the Indianized part of the population, the analogues of
the Avans and Siamese of Tenasserim, and of the Mon of Maulmein. What
are the Arakhan equivalents to the Karien?

_The Khyen._--These inhabit the Yuma mountains between Arakhan and Ava.
A full notice of them is given by Lieutenant Trant, in the sixteenth
volume of the "Asiatic Researches." But as they are chiefly independent
tribes, it is enough to state that they form the Anglo-Burmese frontier.
It is also added that there are numerous Khyen slaves in Arakhan.

Farther notice of them is the less important, because a closely allied
population will occur amongst the hill-tribes of--

_Chittagong._--Hindu elements now increase. Even in Arakhan, Buddhism
had ceased to be the only creed of western origin. There were Mahometans
who spoke a mixed dialect called the _Ruinga_;[27] and Brahminical
Hindus who spoke another called the _Rosawn_. In Chittagong, then, we
must look about u