the language_ is our object, not the history of the people; we
therefore give of statistic and political notices only so much, as
seems to be requisite for the illustration of our subject.

The earliest data for the history of the civilization of the Slavic
race, we find in their mythology; and here their oriental origin
again appears. The antithesis of a good and evil principle is met with
among most of their tribes; and as even at the present time in some
Slavic dialects every thing good, beautiful, praiseworthy, is to them
synonymous with the purity of the white colour, they call the good
Spirit _Bielo Bòg_, the white god; the evil Spirit _Tcherno Bôg_, the
black god. The _Div_ of the old Russians seem to be likewise akin to
the _Dev_ of the Hindoo; the goddess of life, _Shiva_, of the Polabae,
to the Indian _Shiva_; as the names of the Slavic personification of
death, _Morjana_, _Morena_, _Marzana_, evidently stand in connection
with the Indian word for death, _Marana_. Strabo describes some of the
idols of the Rugians, in which we meet again the whole significant
symbolization of the East. The custom prevalent among many Slavic
nations, of females burning themselves with the corpses of their
husbands, seems also to have been brought from India to Europe.

There are, however, other features of their mythology which belong to
them exclusively, and which remind us rather of the sprightly and
poetical imagination of the Greeks. We allude to their mode of
attributing life to the inanimate objects of nature, rocks, brooks and
trees; of peopling with supernatural beings the woods which surrounded
them, the mountains between which they lived. The _Rusalki_ of the
Russians, the _Vila_ of the southern Slavic nations, the _Leshie_ of
several other tribes, nymphs, naiads, and satyrs, are still to be
found in many popular tales and songs. If, however, we have compared