The question of the antiquity of the Chinese nation has long exercised the minds of Sinologists, and various are the conclusions arrived at by them on the subject.

Professor Lacouperie has pointed out that the Chinese are offshoots of the Accadian stock. This I am quite ready to admit; but I cannot agree with him in thinking that the early Chinese Emperors can be identified with Babylonian Kings about 2000 years B.C. There are no ancient monuments, inscribed sarcophagi and stones, or contemporary excessive antiquity; so we are compelled to criticize carefully the evidence handed down to us in the shape of the old Chinese classics.

I closed the Appendix to the last Essay of this series, published in April, 1890, by adducing proof that Māghada and Bhārata were derived from the roots Mag amd Bhṛi, both of which mean “to bring forth,” and that they both meant “the sons of the great mother who brings forth all mankind.”

Before entering on the subject of Transliteration, I propose to submit a few preliminary remarks on the formation of graphic systems generally, and the rules which ought to regulate their application.

In bringing forward a scheme for the conversion of the Arabic character to the Latin—the second most widely spread alphabet of the world to the first—a word may be said as to the objections which the mere mention of such a proposal invariably evolves.

[“This is my last contribution to Indian archæology. It contains views which I have arrived at after a careful and continuous study, extending over twenty-six years, of the Kshatrap coins and inscriptions.” These were among the last words of Paṇḍit Bhagvānlāl Indraji, who almost up to the day of his death was engaged in completing the article now published. Hisv death in March, 1888, was a real loss to Indian archaeology. The tributes paid to his memory by Prof. Peterson in the Academy, by Dr. Bühler in the Indian Antiquary, by Mr. Javerilal Umiashankar Yajnik and Dr. Codrington in the Journal Bombay Asiatic Society, testify to the esteem in which he was held, both as a man and as a scholar, by those who knew him.