wledging my great obligations to this eminent
Sanskritist from whom I have so frequently borrowed. As Mr. Muir has
observed, the Bengal recension which Signor Gorresio has most ably edited
is throughout an admirable commentary on the genuine Ramayan of northern
India, and I have made constant reference to the faithful and elegant
translation which accompanies the text for assistance and confirmation in
difficulties:

"Towards the southern extremity and in the island of Lanka (Ceylon) there
existed undoubtedly a black and ferocious race, averse to the Aryans and
hostile to their mode of worship: their ramifications extended through the
islands of the Archipelago, and some traces of them remain in Java to this
day.

The Sanskrit-Indians, applying to this race a name expressive of hatred
which occurs in the Vedas as the name of hostile, savage and detested
beings, called it the Rakshas race: it is against these Rakshases that the
expedition of Rama which the Ramayan celebrates is directed. The
Sanskrit-Indians certainly altered in their traditions the real character
of this race: they attributed to it physical and moral qualities not found
in human nature; they transformed it into a race of giants; they
represented it as monstrous, hideous, truculent, changing forms at will,
blood-thirsty and ravenous, just as the Semites represented the races that
opposed them as impious, horrible and of monstrous size. But
notwithstanding these mythical exaggerations, which are partly due to the
genius of the Aryans so prone to magnify everything without measure, the
Ramayan in the course of its epic narration has still preserved and noted
here and there some traits and peculiarities of the race which reveal its
true character. It represents the Rakshases as black of hue, and compares
them with black clouds and masses of black collyrium; it attributes to
them curly woolly hair and thick lips, it depicts them as loaded with
chains, collars and girdles of gold, and the other bright ornaments which
their race has always loved, and in which the kindred races of the Soudan
still delight. It describes them as worshippers of matter and force. They
are hostile to the religion of the Aryans whose rites and sacrifices they
disturb and ruin {~HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~} Such is the Rakshas race as represented in the Ramayan;
and the war of the Aryan Rama forms the subject of the epic, a subject
certainly real and historical as far as regards its substanc