'A Journey from Bengal to England, through the Northern part of India, Kashmire, Afghanistan, and Persia, and into Russia, by the Caspian-Sea. By George Forster. In the Civil Service of the Honourable the East-India Company in Two Volumes. Vol. I.' [‎37] (62/342)

FORSTER’S TRAVELS. 37,
author of evil, whom the Godhead drove into an abyfs under the
earth.*
The Hindoos, as Mr. Halhed in his tranflation of the Code
of Hindoo Laws has fully fet forth, are arranged in four grand
cafts, or tribes; that of the Bramin, the Chittery, the Bhyfe,
and the Sooder. Each of thefe cafts is fubdivided into numerous
fefts, the particular ufages of which are preferved with care and
attentive diftinftions. There are fedtaries, alfo of the fame tribe,
who do not admit of the intercourfe of marriage with each other.
earth, yet foft and flimy, produced numerous excrefiences, which, nourifhed and
ftrengthened by the grofs vapours of the night, —the a£Hon of the moon,—and after
wards, by the heat of the day, appeared at length, in the forms of different animals.
Thofe in whom the fire predominated, mounted into air, and became birds : thofe
which participated more of earth, as men, quadrupeds — and reptiles, remained on the
furface, while the more aqueous fubftances defcended to the waters, their proper place
of abode. It was neceflary to give reafons, why nature had flopped in her primary
operations, and did not form many more animal creatures, as the manner of formation
had been fo Ample and eafy. Syftematic philofophy, even in its infancy, did not want
refource; and that of the Egyptians has met the obje&ion, by urging, that nature had
originally infpired every fpecies of animals with the inftindf of propagation ; having
fagely forefeen, that when the fun and the winds had entirely dried the earth, it would
be incapable of producing perfect animals.— See Mr. Labbathier’s Hiflory of Ancient
Nations, tranflated by Mr. Stockdale.
* The writers of the Hindoo mythology, have given various and diffufe defcrip-
tions of the origin of the world, and of the human and animal race, but unite in
blending them with a feries of extravagant and difgufting fables.
f There is in India an aboriginal race of people, who are not clafled in any of the
fe£Is, and confined to the moft menial offices. They are not permitted to enter any
temple of the Hindoos, and they obferve no reflricfion. On fome parts of the coafl
of Coromandel, they are called Dherefand Pariahs j and, in Bengal, Harees,