The gray and venerable Vedaic age is now divided by critics into four periods: the Chhandas period, the Mantra period, the Brahmana period, and the Sutra period. The Chhandas period exhibits the purest patriarchal and peaceful condition of the family. There were then no priests and no division of classes; the father offered up simple sacrifices to heaven, and the simple hymns and songs of the family resounded over the offering. If the household contained any captive of the aboriginal race, such a one, by renouncing his ancient customs and creed, and accepting the language, the faith and the law of the conqueror, retained life and comparative liberty. And, moreover, all ethnological investigations confirm the belief that the aborigines of India were of the negro, or what is commonly called African family. On this American continent the kidnapped and enslaved African has accepted both the creed and the language of his oppressor--but for him there is neither liberty nor law. Not to enslave, but only to subdue--preserving, at least partially, the rights of the conquered--was the policy of the Aryas in their encounter with barbarians. And in the domestic wars of tribes and dynasties which yet dimly echo through the second or Mantra period, no traces of the enslavement of their conquered enemies are to be found. In general, the first two periods not only do not show any shadow of _slavery_ in the domestic and social relations, but even the division into _classes_ or _castes_ does not yet make its appearance. During the third or Brahmana period, the Vedas give an account of the terrible and bloody struggle which ended in the social and religious victory of the Brahmas, or Brahmins, over the Kshatriyas, who had previously formed the ruling families. The Brahmins now reorganized the religious and political structure of the Hindus. They divided society into four classes or castes: (it is to be noted here, however, that some modern exegetists assert that the true meaning of the Sanscrit word _Varna_, for "caste," is not yet clearly apprehended). These four castes were: 1. The Brahmins; 2. The Kshatriyas; 3. The Vaisyas; 4. The Soudras, or Çudras. The first three correspond to the classification already mentioned as existing among the Iranians. The Çudras were the lowest and most degraded caste; still they were not enslaved, not the property of any other caste, not even of the Brahmins--those spiritual and political chiefs of the Hindus. The labors of agriculture ennobled even the hands of the Brahmin, and could not be performed by slaves nor under the compulsory terrors of a master or driver.