slaughter marking the war of the Pandavas, when friends and relatives met in hostile array and slew each other; fixing the beginning of the Cali-yug, the last, most debased, and iron age of time. But however this may be, we turn, with pleasure, even from such international disputes as those of the Sora and Pandion kings, to more interesting relations of the latter with the kings of the Sera country; which relations seem to have been those of commerce. Any vestiges of such intercourse, from manuscript autho rity, are indeed but faint and few; yet it is traditionally known that such intercourse has always existed. We find mention of one Pandion king, who personally traded by sea, though with what country is not stated. The other coast has however always been famous for its exports; and many of these were brought over the mountains, or through the passes, from the Pandiya-mandalam. Dr. Robertson, in his inquiry into the commerce of the ancients with India, has shewn, most satisfactorily, that the Malayalim or Malabar coast partook largely of this traffic. One, at least, of the ancient emporia must have been on that coast. We think, however, he has erred, most remarkably, in fixing the Sera-metropolis in the latitude of Kantcheou, in China, merely because its latitude agrees with that assigned to Sera-metropolis by Ptolemy; whose latitudes cannot with so much precision be depended upon, and are as much condemned by Dr. Robertson, in other cases, as praised in this. Sera-metropolis, we conjecture to be no other than Tiruvanchi, the capital of the Sera-desam, according to our manuscripts. Whoever looks at Ptolemy's distorted map of India, will consider the question of latitude, so far as he is concerned, to be of little consequence. And any attempted derivation of Sera from Serica, because China has usually abounded in silk, would be forced and artificial; especially when an ancient nation of that name existed, which unquestionably held great commercial intercourse with those whom we usually, and somewhat too exclusively, term the ancients. We have noticed, also, that Colonel Wilford, guided perhaps by Dr. Robertson, identifies the Seres with the Chinese; and by means of data from which, aided by our additional documentary information, we should draw a different conclusion. He quotes from Pliny, the language of an ambassador from Ceylon to Rome, (in the time of Claudius,) in which the ambassador says, that he knew the Seres; that they were not very remote from his own country; and that his country people

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traded with them. If the ambassador really came from Ceylon, (that is, if Taprobane, the island mentioned by Pliny, be Ceylon,) he would know the appellation of Seradesam as familiarly as that of his own country: but he would most likely know very little of China, usually called by Hindus Sina-desam, and never Sera-desam. We have read (without knowing at present where to turn for our authority) of an ambassador sent from Rome, by Augustus, to the Pandion king. In that era there was no northern monarch of particular fame except Vicramaditya, who, we believe, was never termed a Pandion; but if commercial relations with the Sera country had made the Roman people acquainted with the importance and ancient fame of the Pandiya-mandalam, it is not impossible that some Italian merchant might have been instructed to penetrate, carrying presents, so far into the interior. Without some such intercourse, we do not see how geographers could have come at their Pandionis-regio and Modura; so obviously of correct native origin. However, it may perhaps be quite unimportant further to extend any such inquiries; and we will therefore return to the internal affairs, more properly such, of India alone.

We are not confined, by our manuscript authorities, to the limits only of two or three small countries. They advert, though often with mortifying brevity, to the whole of India; and to Indian history from the very birth of time. In their brevity, they resemble many other chronicles of ancient countries: for example, Palestine or Persia. The reader, it is hoped, will not reject what they do proffer of information; though he may wish they had been more diffuse, and the annotator somewhat less so. It must be admitted, that some effort has been made to cast a redeeming ray of interest around comparatively meager details, by laying every available source of information, known to exist, under contribution. We trust the result will be to present, both a more full, and a more connected, view of Indian History, from the earliest periods, than has yet been placed before the public; either in England or India. By Indian History, we mean that purely such; for it has heretofore been the fashion to write Indian history only in such portions of it as related to foreign conquerors, and to dominions ruled by foreigners to the soil. Other portions have been given up, for the greater measure, in despair; from want of sufficient documents. Much, it is true, is still deficient: yet an approximation is better than

nothing. In particular we venture to hope, that the important question of Indian chronology will not be found more satisfactorily arranged, in any one place, than we have attempted to effect in this work, by deductions from the most extensive inferential sources available. And while the result confirms some important portions of the Mosaic history, we think it will be admitted, that nothing really contrary to that inspired account can be convincingly, or even plausibly, drawn from Indian sources. The Mosaic narrative must still remain the oldest, best authenticated, and most valuable one in the world. If our researches have in any measure strengthened that conclusion, without any thing further, we should not consider the time employed as entirely wasted. But, in addition to ordinary history, there is a somewhat full exposition of native mythology, from native documents, and not from foreign prejudice, or partiality; through which exposé we do certainly expect some practical results, needless to be detailed. We have sometimes had to wade through matters distasteful; and difficult, with sufficient delicacy, to bring forth to the light, even while feeling it needful to do so, and yet not to offend the purest mind. On this particular we have felt, and do feel, the most trembling solicitude. We trust, however, that no offence has been committed against the laws of delicacy and purity. But we certainly have not exaggerated the worst view of Indian character. Much is left in the shade. Modern ideas of refinement, are better, nobler, and more elevated, than those which have usually prevailed in earlier times; and especially where the holy and sanctifying light of the Christian religion has never shone. The writer disguises not his wish indirectly to urge, by practical exhibition rather than verbal declamation, the duty of holding that light, as clearly and powerfully as possible, before the native mind; yet this wish has been carefully subdued, and will never appear prominent, for the most adequate reasons; and, in part, because the very end sought would thereby be frustrated. And here, once for all, the writer would humbly beg leave to declare his full conviction, that this duty, in the way of active interference, is not the part of rulers; at least in the present state of India: they will rather aid the efforts of duty made by others, only by silent but real neutrality. And we submit, that real neutrality is desirable. We have glanced, in passing, at the philosophy, and at the poetry, of the country more immediately the subject of

illustration; the former of the two is but meager; on the latter point, there remains as yet much to be explored: a dialect more perfect than the poetical Tamil perhaps never existed.

In that period which is nearest to our own times, the records contained in our Manuscripts will be found to form an ascending series with the copious narratives of Mr. Orme, and Colonel Wilks. The latter gentleman, in entitling his work "Historical Sketches of the South of India," is somewhat illogical, seeing that his sketches pertain almost wholly to the Mysore country; which, however prominently brought before the public attention by the events ending in the overthrow of the Mahomedan dynasty, is yet but a small portion of Southern India, and not the most important one. But the work itself is one of great interest; and while it throws a faint ray on some interference of the "Madura-Naicks," that is, rulers of the Carnataca dynasty, in the affairs of Mysore, to their own detriment, it receives some illustration in return, by details of Mysore intervention and conquests, at an earlier date, in the Madura, country. The laborious pages of Mr. Orme, invaluable as they are, may obtain one or two corrections, especially in the opening portion, from the brief narrative in these manuscripts; and in other points they receive additional confirmation. The discrepancies of the two accounts may be possibly sufficiently obvious on comparison; but will, at all events, have some further notice in the proper place. There are yet wanting some fuller details of the Malayalim country, and also of the Carnatic: the former possibly, and very probably the latter, may be capable of further elucidation from the Mc.Kenzie Manuscripts, preserved in the College of Fort St. George, of which an inspection has been promised to the writer, by two gentlemen connected with the Madras Literary Society. Should such an inspection prove to be attainable, and nothing further of importance result from it, personal inquiries may very probably be made at Conjeveram, with a view of getting at some details of the Soren kingdom, and some illustration of the influence exerted by some of the Carnataca lords at a comparatively modern period;. which latter, in particular, will be of advantage to our second volume. If to the above desiderata, any manuscripts could be obtained at Tripetty, concerning the ancient kingdom of Narsimmapuram, and its capital Chandragherri, then details of

Peninsular history, south of the river Krishna, might be regarded as tolerably complete. It is not, however, always that what is desirable is practicable; and our wishes must not be the rule to guide a corrected expectation.

Some little explanation, in passing, of the mode in which the manuscripts to be included in the present work came into the hands of the translator and editor, may not be improper, or uncalled for. They were first procured by Mr. W. C. Wheatley, a confidential employé of our late Governor Lushington, at the time when he was Collector of the District of Ramnad, Tinnevelley, and Madura. Mr. Wheatley was a singularly mild, able, and well-informed man; and, as such, duties of very great importance and responsibility were often confided to him. He has received honorably distinctive notice from Sir Alexander Johnstone, whose researches at Madura he aided. And, at the time when Colonel Mc. Kenzie was making his very extensive inquiries after manuscripts and inscriptions throughout the Peninsula, Mr. Wheatley was pointed out to him as a suitable person to help forward the work. It is one misfortune attendant on the Mc. Kenzie collections, bulky as they are said to be, that they have never been properly digested; and perhaps it is not to be regretted, that these documents now to be brought before the reader did not sink into the same vortex. By what means they failed of reaching their intended destination, the writer has no means of knowing: it might have been by the premature decease of Mr. Wheatley, or by the removal of Colonel Mc.Kenzie to Calcutta. The manuscripts remained in the hands of Mr. Wheatley's relict, by whom they were presented to the translator, on his making inquiries after such documents, in the year 1825. The documents, entitled distinctively, Pandion Chronicle, Supplementary Manuscript, and Carnataca Dynasty, bear the marks of age, though, of course, not of remote time; they are all three in the same native hand writing: the few concluding words at the end of the first, which the editor has distinguished by a [ have evidently been added since, and in a different hand writing. These principal manuscripts, with a variety of smaller ones, written by other hands, some of them made use of in the first volume, and others reserved for the second, were received at the same time. The Stalla Purana was procured afterwards; and is not properly to be numbered among the MSS. intended for Colonel Mc.Kenzie. They all afford

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