Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1878-09-04
Diverse Dialects.

The Pundts have reckoned all the languages
| spoken from Capo Comorin to tho Himalays,
and from the Indus to the Gsgnes, at numbers
| varying from ffty.seven to eighty.four. The
| lowest of these numbers, however, ia an e1.
aggerstion. unless dialects and varieties Of dis.
| lects, with the tongues of many rude and re.
| mote tribes, are included. In all the native
| languages there exists a considerable, and, in
some of them, very considerable admixture Of
foreign tongues
The most important of these foreign mixtures
are the Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian and what
ever TINS foreign element may be, it is always
southwark, until finally, it ia proportionsly
! not greater than the presence of Latin in the
Celtic or OF Arabic in the Spanish The Persisu
language, with the mixtures of Arabic, was In.
troduced by the Mahomstan conquerors about
eight hundred year ago.
These hordes consisted Of many nations with
distinct languages, such as Eastern Toork,
Arabs, Persians. Oozbeks and Afghans. who,
for general convenience, adopted Persian as the
vehicle of REORGANIZATION; and it eventu'
tally came to be the language of the court of the
law, and ofdiplomacy. Bengal is the vernscu-
who number about forty millions, not one Of
whom is ever found in the ranks of any Indian
army. TO the south of the Bengali, On the
Madras border. comes the Ooriya, or language
of Orissa. not Of wide extension, though spoken
by three millions Of people. who are industrious
and orderly, but who never acquired promi-
nent position in Indian history.
The most southern of what may be called the
northern division of languages is the Mahratti,
the speech of 8 rude and warlike race, little
known in the animals Of India until the middle
of the seventeenth century. On the western
side Of India is the Guzerath, the original
tongue used on the Gu1erat peninsula! to which
also belong two subordinate dialects, the Kutchi
and Sndi, spoken in Hutch and Sind. Then
there are the Punjaubi and Pushtoo spoken IN
the country of the Five Rivers and in Afghsnis-
tan, and which areincluded among the northern
languages.
Among the southern languages the first Is
the Teoogoo or Teinga 80 rough in pronuncia-
ton that traveller of tho nation, speaking il
before ruler of Bokhsrs, admitted that its
sound resembled the tossing of lot Of pebbles
in sack. 1t bears no resemblance in sound or
structure, beyond it Sanscrit ingredient. to
any of the northern languages; but tho people
speaking it, called GeRtoos, number some eight
millions of souls. South CT them, again, comes
tho Tamil, CT simple structure, and one Of the
speech.
Its range extends to tho extreme southern
promontory of India, and embraces both the
western and eastern coasts. Along the western
coast, where the Tamil ceases and the Konkanl
dialect of the Mahrstti commences, the Mulay-
alum is spoken which is good deal internixed
with the Tamil. The name of this language
which is also that of the people using it, is tho
word corrupted into the better known Malsbar
The next great language of Southern India is
the Ksnaress, lying between the mountainous
ranges known as the Ghauts
The last three tongues are spoken by some
sixteen OF seventeen millions Of people. Bur"
msh Assam, Arrscan, Tennasserim and Pegu
have each their own written language ALI the
great tongues of India, whether northern Or
ham hair ior lph hats
agreeing with that in which Sanskrit is usually
written only in phonetic classification. Within
British India there are probably not fewer than
thirty indigenous sets Of speech. but besides
these, there are several rude unwritten lsu.
gusgea needless to specify.