in the main ground-work of language, in monosyllables, in the names of numbers, and the appellations of such things as would be first discriminated on the immediate dawn of civilization. The resemblance which may be observed in the characters upon the medals and fignets of various districts of Asia, the light which they reciprocally reflect upon each other, and the general analogy which they all bear to the same grand Prototype, afford another ample field for curiosity. The coins of Assam, Napaul, Cashmeere and many other kingdoms are all stamped with Shanscrit letters, and mostly contain allusions to the old Shanscrit Mythology : the same conformity I have observed on the impressions of seals from Bootan and Tibet. A collateral inference may likewise be deduced from the peculiar arrangement of the Shanscrit alphabet, so very different from that of any other quarter of the world. This extraordinary mode of combination still exists in the greatest part of the East, from the Indus to Pegu, in dialects now apparently unconnected, and in characters completely dissimilar; but is a forcible argument that they are all derived from the same source. Another channel of speculation presents itself in the names of persons and places, of titles and dignities, which are open to general notice, and in which, to the farthest limits of Asia, may be found ma-
