Miscellanea (the Lushais) (etc.)

MISCELLANEA AND CORRESPONDENCE. THE LUSHAIS. From a Narrative Report by Capt. W. F. Badgley, B. S. C. Topographical Survey. The Lushais, of whom we met men of four different tribes, are fairer than the Bengalis, of a very uniform height of about five feet six inches, well made, active, intelligent, and energetic. Of their figures we had one or two opportunities of judging, especially on one occasion when some iron hoops of burnt barrels were in the fire, to get which, and to save their clothes from accident, they stripped,-an easy operation with men whose only covering is a large square of cloth. The figures they displayed were splendid, full, and finely muscular, especially about the shoulders and calves, though in the latter they showed a more graceful shape than the large-legged Kukis and Nagas who were with us as coolies. That they were intelligent we had, not knowing their language, less chance of forming an opinion; but from what we could judge from a few who understood some words of Hindustani, and from their quick recognition of sketches, even in outline, and from their looks, which otherwise belied them, they were so. Of their energy and activity their raids are sufficient proof. Their heads are well formed, with good foreheads, oblique eyes, heavy eyebrows, high cheekbones, depressed noses, large but not thick lips, and scanty beards, a few straggling hairs in some being the only representatives of chin-tuft or moustache, beyond which none of them can boast. Their hair is straight and black or brownish, eyes brown or black, and teeth invariably good; their expression open, bold, and generally pleasing, and their voice loud and sonorous, partly probably from practice and education, the children having the same deep far-sounding tones when calling loudly. Their dress is admirable in its ease; no boots, nor breeches, nor other tight clothing confine the freedom of their limbs; a large square cloth or two put on together, according to the temperature, is their only covering, which is worn passed under the right arm and with two corners thrown in opposite directions over the left shoulder, and managed for modesty with the most easy dexterity. To confine the cloth upon the left shoulder, they carry, when anywhere from home, a bag slung so as to rest behind the right hip, the shoulder-strap being of skin, tiger's apparently by preference, and the bag, which is of fine and strong net, covered with a large skin flap somewhat like a sporran, and often made of long white goat's-hair, with three black streaks. In the bag they carry their smoking apparatus, flint and steel, a dhao or large chopping-knife, and occasionally a bundle of pangis, which are small hardened bamboo skewers, and which stuck in the ground are very efficient

protection to their owner when sleeping in strange places, and left behind him in his path protect him in some degree when pursued. We saw, as I said, men of four separate tribes, three of them distinguished by their mode of wearing their hair, and the southern tribes rather smaller and handsomer than the northern. Those we first met, who had come from Kulel, and are now living on Banbong, called themselves Howlongs, and are governed by an old woman, Impanu, the mother of their former chief, Vonpilal, whose grave is on Kulel. The name of the next tribe, those under Poiboi and Lal Bur, I quite forgot to ascertain. The remaining two were Pois and Paites. The former were inhabitants of the country south of Lal Bur's, who had apparently hired themselves out as soldiers; and the latter, probably a very small tribe, living on and about Narklang. Of these the two first wore their hair drawn smoothly back, and fastened in a knot behind by a thin bit of iron bent into a double prong. The Pois parted theirs across the head behind, and letting the lower part hang loose drew the upper forward, twisting it with the front hair, tied it in a knot over their foreheads, where it was secured by an iron skewer or with a comb of ivory; round this knob those who wore turbans tied one end in, putting them on after the manner of the Sikhs, which was remarked by some Lushais, who called the 22 nd Poi; about a fourth of the Pois wore turbans, the other tribes, as a rule, going bareheaded. The Paites wore their hair frizzed up from their head, and cut about four inches long. Chiefs and headmen wear feathers in their hair-knots on great occasions, that is, those who have them; how the Paites wear them, or whether they use any, I do not know. Of the Suktis, who live to the eastward, we saw next to nothing; they are at enmity with these other tribes, and, thinking to take them at a disadvantage, had, just before we reached the Champhai, made an attack on Lal Bur's village of Chouchim, whence they had been repulsed with loss, leaving one body behind. This unfortunate's head and some limbs had been placed as ornaments to Vonolel's tomb in Lungvel, but as it had been scalped, gouged, and the skull smashed in, little could be made out from it. There are two things remarkable about these people-one, their indifference to ornaments; excepting two, which are very simple, they wear none: these are a tiger's tooth or tuft of goat's hair tied with a string round the neck, and a small tuft of scarlet feathers stuck in, or an amber bead hung by a string to the ear. Some of the children wore strings of beads, but very few of the men; and coloured chintz was scoffed at as a barter, though anything might be got for plain red or white; silver and gold have they none, and care little for, a few pice re-purchasing a rupee; but these are at a premium merely because they can be beaten into bullets or used to line pipes. The second is that, though not particularly cleanly, they are entirely free from any of those noisome skin diseases which are so common in Kachar, and only one man did we see marked with small-pox. We saw no dwarfs or cripples; probably they are made away with early, after the Spartan fashion. Of the mental and other qualities of the Lushais, as far as one could judge, they are quick-tempered, unstable in mind, loose in allegiance, thieving, and occasionally given to drunkenness, violence, and barbarity; inquisitive, taciturn in conversation, patriotic, and too bold to be liars; their bump of locality must be strongly marked; they are great hunters and athletic, walking long distances, and climbing with remarkable ease. From the smallest children they all smoke,-men and women,-and so much are they given to it that any of their recent camps can always be detected by their stale tobacco smell. Their pipes are neatly made of bamboo lined with iron or copper, and of the ordinary pipe shape for the men, those used by the women having a receptacle for water, after the fashion of a hubble-bubble, which water-disgusting practice!-is carried about by the men in little gourd bottles to take occasional nips from. They have some sort of religious belief, but I heard no mention of priest, nor were there any temples or images. Occasionally, in the field we met with a little cleared space on which were arranged rows of clay pallets of various shapes, with a yard-long flagstaff and coloured pendent waving over them, but it was in their tombs that we saw the greatest evidences of their religion. These were always in their villages and ornamented with trophies of skulls of animals and feathers. At burials they discharge firearms over the graves, and I believe slay the animals, whose heads afterwards go to their decoration, and whose spirits are intended for the delectation of the grave's occupant in the happy hunting-ground. The greater the man the more animals are sent with him, and it is said that slaves are sometimes sacrificed and buried with a chief. Vonolel's and Vonpilal's tombs had the heads of many beasts over them (indeed one got a knowledge of the larger fauna of the country at a glance); the skulls of the most dangerous were muzzled, and there were hobbles to restrain the feet. Beyond what can be gathered from what I have mentioned,-that they must believe in a future state, and that there is some invisible power for evil, against whom they make their incantations to

protect their crops,--I could not discover anything, excepting that the tiger's tooth or tuft of hair which the men wear about their necks has a religious signification. Their language is not monosyllabic like the Khasia and others, and there is no written character. Tradition is probably handed down by songs, which are of their battles, their hills, and love; and they can improvise. One night a party were invited to give us a specimen of their performances, and the first of the songs was on the subject of our expedition. They chaunt them in soft deep notes to the accompaniment of a drum and a set of weak organ-like pipes, whose stops include an octave; and the love-song they afterwards gave us was acted to in a posturing dance by one of the number, at first slowly, but as the story went on, more and more quickly, till the corn-cob, which represented the young woman sung to, was snatched up and whirled round quite excitedly. I have said before, I think they are mighty hunters; everything that runs or flies is game with them, from an elephant to a field-rat, from a hornbill to a wagtail; and they have many and clever devices for bringing them to the pot, using, besides firearms, traps and fenced drives for the larger, and springs for the small game, and for small birding employing the pellet-bow. Game should be plentiful, judging from the numbers of heads we saw in front of the houses, which are not preserved beyond the owner's lifetime. These were of elephant, tiger, leopard, sambur, hog-deer, metna, pig, and monkey. This last-the hulak or howling monkey, black-faced, grey-whiskered, blackbodied and tail-less, with very long arms and of extraordinary activity-is an abominably noisy beast, with a cry beginning with a yell, and ending with a series of howls like men imitating jackals; they are always started, by the way, in their discordant chorus, by a single sharp cry from one of them, which my fellows called the raja. Of birds I saw the skulls of some cranes, and they have, besides many which I did not find out, hornbills, jungle fowl, partridges (francolines), chir, and black pheasants. Of fish I only saw two varieties, the mashir and a small silurus, called in the north-west sol. They use nets, and also, as is the custom elsewhere, poison the water with the juice of a cactus which kills the fish without spoiling them as food, and in one place, the camp on the Tui-burn, they had built a large dam and weir, apparently for fishing purposes. Their mode of war is of surprises and bush-fighting, and their ideas of bravery are amusing. At Vanug (the first fight) they called out to the sepoys not to stick like cowards in the open, but to come against them in the jungle like men. For weapons they have flint-locks, some wonderfully old, dating back to Culloden, spears and dhaos; we saw a few leather shields, but no bows and arrows. For defence, though their villages are lightly palisaded, they prefer the employment of stockades in difficult passes defended by entanglements, a specimen of which, which was quite a lesson in military engineering, we met with, fortunately undefended, a mile or so from Poiboi's village of Tulcheng. I have been told, by the way, that the village of the chief is never palisaded, his outlying villages being guardians against attack, or least unprepared for attack. They carry on feuds and make raids among themselves as well as on Manipur and the eastern provinces for arms, ammunition, women, and heads. When on raids they travel with remarkable celerity, carrying nothing but their arms and enough of rice for the journey, a fresh joint of bamboo at each new camp serving every purpose of water-jar or cooking-pot. About to make an attack, they are told off in three parties, gunmen, spearmen, and men to carry off the wounded on retreat; if they have been successful and have made prisoners, the men are made to carry the provisions, and though they sometimes retain a few as slaves, specially Manipuris and Kukis, the carrier is, as a rule, relieved of his head when he has been relieved of his burthen. I think it was after the raid on Monir Khal that a body was found-a garden cooly's-which appeared as if an incantation had been practised by it; the head was not removed, and the chest was cut open and filled with boiled rice: why so I could not find out. Notwithstanding their cruelty, they are fine fellows, taking pride in a fight, dressing themselves in their best and neatest for the occasion, and showing in their own way considerable pluck; and in their communities I imagine they are moral and courteous, the ever-ready dhao being a potent preventive to bad conduct and bad manners. Mantris (heralds?), men wearing feathers and red pagris, are employed among these people to treat of war and peace and all matters, and at all times pass free; but besides these verbal means of communication they have modes of spreading intelligence known to themselves, as by fire signals, alarm drums and gongs, and others. A tree exuding a red sap hacked and struck with spikes is a serious warning; a red gourd stuck in a tuft of grass means bloody heads for those who persevere in advancing beyond it; a branch across the path is a notice not to go further; and a bamboo split, broken, and burnt, means fire and fury. A Lushai village is usually built in a position which gives natural advantages for defence. It is

slightly fenced, and the approaches guarded at difficult points by palisading, loop-holed and strengthened by heavy stones, and on commanding view-points there are out-looks. The conservancy is admirable, and the houses, though smoke-begrimed from having their fire-places inside, are clean. Each house usually has its own enclosed patch of fenced kitchen-garden to one side, and, though not built perfectly symmetrical, they are ranged to form streets. In the middle of the town is a large house used as a town-hall. The frame-work of a house is of wood for the posts and beams, and bamboo for the roof; the floor is raised a few feet above the ground, and is laid with bamboo split and beaten flat, the walls being of the same material, woven in a large chequer pattern with very neat effect; the roof is a thatch of grass and palm leaves. The average dimensions are 30 by 12 (Poiboi's was 40 yards long), of which the first third is left open; a ramp of logs leads up to them, and on one side of the ramp is a platform for sitting out in fine weather; under the eaves are the fowl-houses, and hung over the house-front are the skull and horns of animals captured in the chase. The interior, which is closed by a neatly-made sliding door, is usually undivided; in some a half-partition portions off a part as a granary; a door at the back leads to a small platform behind. In the middle of one side an open fireplace is made of slabs of stone, above which hangs a frame for smoking meat and fish, and beyond it is usually a raised place for sleeping on. In the open front of the house is the pig-trough and the mortar for cleaning rice-a work done by the women daily. This rice, which is of large white grain and very nutritious, forms their principal food, and is grown by dry cultivation on cleared spots on the hillsides. Their method of agriculture is-having selected a patch of jungle and marked it by putting arrows in the split stumps of small trees round it, to fell and burn it when dry just before the rains, and, scattering the ashes, to dibble in the grain with dhaos, deserting the spot after three years when the soil is worked out. The crop cut at its proper season is threshed and stored on the ground till the end of the harvest, when it is carried in by the women in large baskets slung by a band across the forehead, their mode of carrying all burthens. Besides the rice they raise maize, a sort of yam, sweet potatoes, beans of several sorts, ginger, tobacco, pot-herbs, gourds, squashes, cotton, plantains, and plants giving a dark-blue dye, and they domesticate pigs, goats, dogs, fowls, and pigeons, all for food; milk they never touch, and the metna, which they allow to roam half-wild, is kept only for its flesh and horns, the latter being made, for one thing, into powder and priming flasks. Sugar is a thing they do not seem to care about, but they liked our rum, and themselves prepare a liquor from rice which has a pleasant taste, and is drunk, well diluted, by suction through reeds from the jar in which it is made. We called it hill-beer. Their name for it is "ju." They manufacture everything necessary to their simple mode of living-cooking and liquor pots, wooden platters, baskets, salt, saltpetre, cotton cloth, dhaos, and axes. The earthenware is moulded. The baskets are of every shape and size, from the store basket, which will hold 50 maunds, to the little thing which holds the woman's needles and thread: they are woven of shreds of bamboo with great neatness. Gourds and bamboos are used for water. Their apparatus for cleaning, carding, spinning, and weaving the cotton is similar to that in use in Bengal. The cloth is very strong and closegrained, in breadths of three feet, unbleached, with a narrow blue border, or dyed entirely blue. Some of the cloth used by them, resembling a dark tartan, is said to come from Manipur. Salt they manufacture from the ashes of bamboo leaves, and saltpetre from cowdung urinated on. Their forges are not in any way remarkable, a pair of large bamboo cylinders being the bellows: but they turn out remarkably good arms, working up the iron which they get from elsewhere to suit their own tastes as to shape. The axes are of that peculiar construction used among most of these tribes-a flat-ended peg tied in a socket in a bamboo handle. There are no archaeological remains, excepting the rough slabs, with rough outlines of figures cut on them, which cover old graves; and there are no roads, communication being by footpaths, which in the more populated parts are broad and easy. I had almost forgotten to mention the women, but we saw so little of them; they are pleasant, round, flat-faced creatures, continually smoking, and lively among themselves; their dress is a scanty blue kilt, and cloth thrown over the shoulders, with the head usually uncovered, and the hair loose or neatly braided. They wear no ornaments. They vary in colour, some being quite fair with rosy cheeks. Their children are carried on their backs. The products of the country are India-rubber, wax, and ivory, usually bartered for salt. The traders are mostly Manipuris.-*Report of the Topograph. Survey of India, 1871-72.* ON PROF. HOERNLE'S THEORY OF THE GENITIVE POSTPOSITIONS. SIR,-The question of the origin of the genitive postpositions in the modern vernaculars of India

is so important and interesting that I trust you will allow me space for a few remarks on the reply of Prof. Hoernle, published in the July number of your valuable periodical. As regards my view on the different kinds of Prakrt, I agree with Mr. Beames, that none of the Prakrts was ever a spoken language, and that in order to learn what was the spoken language of the Aryans we must turn principally to the modern vernaculars. I have never had any other opinion on this subject, and in this respect there is no controversy at all between Prof. Hoernle and myself. But I am sorry to see that Prof. Hoernle still adheres to the error which I had already pointed out in my review of his essays. It is perfectly erroneous to say that Vararuchi's sutras are founded upon the plays, or that the plays are founded upon Vararuchi's sutras. The language of the plays is Sauraseni, and the language taught by Vararuchi in the first nine sections is Maharashtri, of which dialect comparatively few instances occur in the plays. Now it is clear that a man who teaches the Maharashtri will not derive the rules for that language from the Sauraseni. It is true that Vararuchi, XII. 32, distinctly says sesham Maharashtrivat, and that on the whole he does not make many exceptions from the principal Prakrt. But this is only one of his numerous blunders. Later Prakrt grammarians, especially Ramatarkavagisa and Markandeya Ravindra, who treat more carefully of the lower dialects, have a good many more rules, which are confirmed throughout by the plays. Vararuchi's rules in the first nine sections are derived from works like the Saptasati and the Setubandha, which were written in Maharashtri and composed in verse. This is clearly proved by the corresponding rules of Hemachandra, who adds numerous examples which are exactly like the poems of the Saptasati, and several of them already to be found in Prof. Weber's edition. Hence it is ridiculous to affirm that the Prakrt of the plays has been grammarized by Vararuchi and his successors. The imaginary participle kunno can by no means be used to explain the Gujarati postpositions. That the colloquial has many forms which in the literary language are restricted to poetry is an old story, but those words are then of frequent occurrence in either the colloquial or the poetry; kunno, however, is not yet found, and I have not met with it, though I am in possession of extensive materials drawn from manuscripts. Prof. Hoernle is very partial to words formed according to analogy; but such words never prove anything; if the participle kunno had given rise to the Gujarati postpositions, it ought to be found very often. The principal question, however, is that concerning the genitive postpositions in Bangali and Oriya. I think still that it is very easy to prove that Prof. Hoernle is in error. In fact there are no postpositions at all in Bangali and Oriya, and these two languages must be separated at once from all the rest. Prof. Hoernle remarks that my statements as to the use of keraka have no particular bearing on the question whether the Bangali er is a curtailment of keraka or not. My arguments already intimated in my review, where I have tried to state them as briefly as possible, are as follows:-Firstly, the word kera is the original of the word keraka, and hence it follows that kera has not been curtailed, but, on the contrary, has been lengthened. The word kera or keraka is found in the Maharashtri, the Sauraseni, and the Magadhi; it is found in the various Apabhramsas as well as in the vernaculars. In the Sinhalese language, as Prof. Childers informs me, it is used to form the locative of a certain class of words. Prof. Kern has lately called attention to the very common use of this word in the language of the gipsies; but even there kero has not been changed in the least, but has remained unaltered to the present day, as stated by Prof. Pott, Paspati, and other authorities. The word, though not noticed by Vararuchi, is well known to the later Prakrt grammarians. Hemachandra, VIII. 2, 147, has a special sutra running thus: || idamarthasya kerah || idamarthasya pratyayasya kera ity adeso bhavati | yushmadiyah tumhakero | asmadiyah amhakero | na cha bhavati | maiapakkhon | paninia. Since Hemachandra in the following sutra: || pararajabhyam kkadikkau cha || expressly mentions the two words para and rajan, I am inclined to suppose that the use of kera was originally restricted to the same words which, according according to Panini, may assume in Sanskrt the suffix kiya. This question I shall discuss at full length in my edition of Hemachandra's Grammar. A sutra corresponding to that of Hemachandra occurs in Markandeya, fol. 28 b; and in the Trivikramavrtti II. 1, 8, we have: || kera idamarthe || idamarthe vihitasya chhapratyayasya kera ity adeso bhavati | and now Trivikrama, as usual, gives the same examples as Hemachandra. Simharaja, fol. 43 a, has the same sutra. Hemachandra mentions the word again in the section on the Apabhramsa, VIII. 4, 422: || sambandhinah keratanau || gaaii sukesari piahu jalu nischimtai harinaim | jasu kerem humkaradem muhahu padanti trnaim |. The same is given by Trivikrama, III. 3, 51, and means in Sanskrt: gatah sa kesari pibantu jalam nischinta harinah yasya (sambandhina) humkarena mukhat patanti trnani |: "The lion is gone; without fear may the antelopes drink the water; (the lion) by

whose roaring, from their mouth fulls the grass." Again, Markandeya in the section on the Savari, a kind of Samdali, has the sutra (fol. 66 $b$) : $||$ kerake kelake vasyat $||$ amhakerakam Dhanam amhakelakam va $||$; and Chandrasekhara, the best commentator of the Sakuntala, remarks : kerakasabdah prakrte atmiye vartate. Thus kera, keraka, kelaka are found even in the latest and most corrupt dialects. When should it have been curtailed, and what particular necessity could induce the Bangalis alone to shorten it, while all the others have either lengthened it or retained it unaltered? According to Vararuchi, III. 18, 19, corresponding to Hemachandra, VIII. 1. 155 and VIII. 2. 63-64, Trivikrama, I. 4. 59-60. the words turya, surya, and dhairya may elide the ya and become tura, sura, dhira (comp. Lassen, *Inst. pracr.* p. 247). After the same principle karya becomes kara; the word has not been noticed by the grammarians, because it existed already in Sanskrit. This kara is preserved in the Bangali genitive apanakara, i.e. apana + kara, and has been curtailed to amara, tomara, and in Urdu to hamara, tumhara. Hemachandra, VIII. 4. 434, in the section on the Apabhramsa has the sutra : $||$ yushmadader iyasya darah $||$ apabhramse yushmadadibhyah parasya iyapratyayasya dara ity adeso bhavati $||$, and among the examples tuhara, amhara, mahara are quoted. Trivikrama, III. 3. 23, and mharaja, fol. 73 $b$, have : $||$ chhasya yushmadader darah $||$. If we compare these sutras with the sutras mentioned above, nobody, I think, can doubt that ara, which, as the Bangali shows, originally was kara, and our kera are only modifications of the same word, viz. karya. Kara could easily be curtailed after a homogeneous vowel, being of frequent occurrence already in Sanskrit; but karya in the shape of kera is a mere Prakrtic word. Originally its use was restricted to the pronouns and the words para and rajan; afterwards it was lengthened and used in connection with substantives. It has never been curtailed. Secondly, the change of r to l forbids us to accept Prof. Hoernle's theory. There can be no doubt that kelaka is the more modern form; and that the change of r to l in this word is not artificial, but thoroughly organic, is proved by the Marathi kela, keli, kelem, and the Low Hindi kaila mentioned by Prof. Hoernle himself. Indeed it would be a strange phenomenon if the same word kera had not only retained its original shape in the vernaculars, but had also been changed into kela and again shortened to er. This is impossible, because it is unnatural and against the genius of language. Thirdly, keraka is nowhere a sort of affix. If we style keraka an affix, we must do the same with innumerable other adjectives. Keraka is never used in the Mrchchhakatika or any other play in the sense of a genitive postposition; it never determines the case of another noun; it has never been anything else but a real adjective noun. Prof. Hoernle denies having said that the genitive of santana was formerly santana keraka. At p. 132, however, he says : "Take, for instance, the genitive of santana, a child; it would be santana keraka." What else can this mean but what I have concluded from it? That the Bangali adjectives have dropped all case, number, and gender terminations I knew as well as Prof. Hoernle does : but exactly because all of them have done it, and because this is the rule, it is difficult to see how keraka alone could have been curtailed to such an extent. In the language of the gipsies, where, as I have remarked above, kera is very frequently employed, the adjectives are treated in almost the same way as in Bangali, but still kera had retained its old shape. Whether keraka occurs fourteen or twenty-eight times in the Mrchchhakatika is of no consequence. I should not have mentioned that at all if I had not been struck by the astonishing confidence with which Prof. Hoernle asserted that this word in the determinative sense-according to his views-is found in the Mrchchhakatika only : a confidence all the more astonishing as he confesses now himself that he has not even examined, to say nothing of read, such plays as the Malavika and the Mudrarakshasa! That the word keraka must have been very common in the colloquial speech Prof. Hoernle need not tell me. This, however, is no reason why it should have been curtailed; the question is not how often keraka occurs, but what changes it may have undergone. If every word of frequent occurrence were curtailed to one syllable, our language would soon resemble the Chinese language. It is due to the uncritical editions of Sanskrit plays by the Indian Pandits that the word is not met with oftener in other plays. In the Sakuntala I shall restore it in three more passages where the best manuscripts have it, though it is not found in any of the present editions of this play. The first instance which I quoted from the Sakuntala is not a false one; keraka is used there pleonastically; it could be omitted very well. The second instance is not in the least doubtful, but as certain as anything can be. Monier Williams is no authority, his edition-apart from its being a pons asinorum-being founded upon the worst possible manuscripts. I gladly recognize the superiority of Prof. Hoernle in every other respect, but as for the Sakuntala I must lay claim to know a little more about the play than he, having collated,

besides all the MSS. used by Prof. M. Williams, four Dravidian, five Bangali, and two Devanagari MSS., and having copied two Dravidian commentaries of which Prof. Hoernle has not even heard the names. Thus I think I am entitled to judge whether a reading is doubtful or not. For all questions concerning this play I have much pleasure in referring Prof. Hoernle to my papers on the recensions of the Sakuntala: Breslau, 1870, and Gottingen, 1873. Prof. Hoernle seems to be of opinion that everybody who does not speak the literary language speaks slang; there is, however, a great difference between the colloquial and the slang-keraka is colloquial but not at all slang. The form kerika is a false one; it is not supported by the MSS. I cannot see why Prof. Hoernle has been obliged to trust his Calcutta edition. There has been published a much better edition (Saka 1792) which is accessible to everybody who cares to get it; this edition (p. 252, b) has also bappakelake. The mistake is not so slight as Prof. Hoernle wishes to represent it. Keraka no doubt has the meaning of "own," "peculiar to," "belonging to," but it now rests with him to show how the participle krta came to receive this meaning. His reasoning was that, as prakelaka is the same as prakrta, thus kelaka is the same as krta; and as kara means the same as prakara, thus krta means the same as prakrta (p. 131.) I cannot discover any other passage in his essays where he alludes to the subject again. Thus I must still maintain that this error, which shows a complete want of criticism, invalidates all his deductions, and I am afraid that the absurdity imputed to me by Prof. Hoernle is his own. On the other hand I have endeavoured to show how keraka came to its meaning. Unfortunately Prof. Hoernle has not been able to understand me; for at p. 212 of his reply he says that I have adduced the words kajjam and kichcham as used in the same way as he says kera or keraka is. Nothing was further from my thoughts, and I cannot make out how it is possible to misunderstand me so utterly. I have quoted all these passages in order to prove that kajjam and keram are used exactly in the same way, and hence that, as kajjam cannot but be derived from karyam, the same must hold good for keram. I have adduced these instances only for the sake of the meaning of keraka, and instead of recognizing the striking evidence, which really admits of no doubt, Prof. Hoernle imputes me a folly of which I was not capable. He then goes on to observe that the identification of kera with krta is an old traditional one of the Pandits. I confess that I prefer European criticism to the tradition amongst the Pandits; besides I am able to show that this tradition has never been universal. In the margin of the best and very old MS. of the Sakuntala, which is most carefully written, the word keraka is rendered twice by karya. This interpretation is due to the Pandit Tapadeva. There can be no doubt that Prof. Lassen has been quite positive in his opinion on the origin of kera. Prof. Hoernle quotes only the first passage, but there are several others, two of which I have already quoted. Nevertheless Prof. Hoernle omits them altogether. At p. 130 Prof. Lassen says: "similis ratio est e ex i orsi, prorsus autem diversa ejus e quod ex a vel a conflatur admixto i sequentis syllabae ut tettia, keraka." And now he refers the reader to the first passage. The third passage is at p. 247: "i hoc ex ya orsum, si liquidam r excipit saepius transponitur, ita ut coalescat cum a vel a praecedenti in k; kera e karia pro karya;" and here he refers to p. 189, where he simply states as a fact "keram a karya cfr. kerakam." The fourth passage is at p. 367: "post r aut jja fit ex rya, kajja e karya, aut dissolvitur rya in ia, karya, karia, kera; nam i antecedenti syllabae inscribitur." The fifth passage is App. p. 58: "compara cum hoc vocabulo (scil. with achchera) karya cujus forma solita est kajja; in versibus etiam kera legitur. Inde derivatum keraka in prosa, tamen saepe legitur." Who except Prof. Hoernle can doubt that Lassen has derived kera from karya? Prof. Weber says that the "e" has originated from "a" under the influence of a following ya. I am unable to discover an "a" and a ya in krta, but I find them both in karya. Karya becomes karia, afterwards kaira, and hence in Prakrt kara; and the e, originally long, has been shortened afterwards. It is not necessary to suppose a form karra, as Prof. Kern does. A doubling of the r is forbidden by all Prakrt grammarians, and never found in Prakrt. In every other respect I agree with Prof. Kern in the way he has traced back kera to karya. The change of t to d in krta is restricted to the Magadhi dialect by all Prakrt grammarians who have come to my knowledge, and indeed is found in this dialect only. Kada has always been local, and cannot be used to account for kera. That in Marathi kela is the equivalent of krta proves nothing; many words may be the equivalents of others without being derived from them. Thus in parakera, &c. kera is the equivalent of the Sanskritic krva, but I doubt whether even Prof. Hoernle would derive kera from krya. Prof. Hoernle again takes refuge in an imaginary Prakrtic word, "karita," without meeting with better success. The "i" in karita, being a mere conjunctive vowel, would never effect a change from a to i. Besides, what is the use of dealing with imaginary words where words of every-day occur-

rence afford all we wish? Whither such fanciful theories must lead, will be seen best from Prof. Hoernle's fourth essay, which has just reached me. That the Marathi kardvem has sprung from the Prakritic causative kardvemi (Vararuchi, VII. 27) Prof. Lassen saw forty years ago. R. PISCHEL. London, August 27, 1873.
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SIR,-In re-reading Professor Weber's Essay on the Ramayana in your Journal, I find that he twice (pp. 123, 176) touches the question whether "Sopeithes, king of the Kekeoi, who entered into friendly personal relations with Alexander the Great, may be identified with Asvapati, king of the Kekaya, who is mentioned in the Ramayana." As Prof. Weber quotes Lassen (I. 300, II. 161), it is possible that he allowed Lassen's words to supersede his own recollection of the original authorities about Alexander. (I. 300.) Lassen's first note, in which he identifies the Kekeoi with the Kekaya, both with the people of Sopeithes, and Sopeithes with Asvapati, is too long for extract. In the second passage he says: "Alexander went northward from Sangala with the main body of his army, into the land of the Kekaya, whose king was called Sopeithes. This would not, however, be his proper names, but rather his title, for already in epic story there is a king of that people called Acvapati." There is nothing in the world so easy as to be mistaken, but I have twice carefully searched Arrian, Diodorus, Strabo, and Curtius, without being able to find a word to indicate that Sopeithes was king of the Kekeoi, or in any way connected with them. That name seems to occur only once anywhere, and then in a doubtful reading. It is where Arrian (Indica, cap. vi.) speaks of Hydrastes as receiving a tributary called Saranges ek Kekeon, or ek Keneon, or ek Mekeon. Nor is there anything in the four authors just named to the effect that Alexander went northward from Sangala. I notice this matter because it bears on General Cunningham's identification of Sangala with the site in the Rechna Doab still so called, an identification which seems to me, if I may presume to say so, eminently satisfactory. According to that view, Alexander, after his destruction of the city, did go north into the country of Sopeithes, but instead of being in the sub-Himalaya, this country apparently lay a cheval on the Hydaspes and Acesines. and included the Salt Range or a part of it. This is confirmed by Arrian's statement (*Exp. Alex.* vi. 2) that Alexander, when about to descend the Hydaspes, sent in advance two divisions of his army under Craterus and Hephaestion, one on each bank, appointing the rendezvous, where his arrival with the fleet was to be awaited, at the Residence of Sopeithes. This rendezvous was reached by the king after a voyage of three days down-stream from Bucephalia. Strabo says that in the territory of Sopeithes there was a mountain of fossil salt sufficient for all India. This is a reasonable hyperbole if applied to the salt-mines of Kheora, near Pind Dadan Khan. It is true there are said to be salt-mines also in Mandi, where Lassen places the Kekaya, Kekeoi, Asvapati and Sopeithes, but they must be comparatively insignificant. Certainly they are very little known. For the rest of the argument I refer to Gen. Cunningham's book. My present object is only to bar what seems an unproved assumption on the other side, to which high sanction has been lent incidentally. H. YULE.
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DEAR SIR,-In reply to a query in the last number of the *I. A., I send a line to state that we have many villages here where the Patil's vatan* is divided into two holdings or bans, each enjoyed by a family entirely distinct from the other, and usually of a different caste. Thus, for instance, one family will be Lingayats, and the other Marathas, or Kanarese Brahmans. The same is often the case with Kulkarni vatans Yours faithfully, H. B. BOSWELL. Belgaum District, 13 th November 1873.
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Calcutta is a place known from remote antiquity. The ancient Hindus called it by the name of Kalikshetra.† It extended from Bahula to Dakhinashar. Bahula is modern Bahala, and the site of Dakhinashar still exists. According to the Puranas a portion of the mangled corpse of Sati or Kali fell somewhere within that boundary; whence the place was called Kalikshetra. Calcutta is a corruption of Kalikshetra. In the time of Ballal Sen it was assigned to the descendants of Sera. PUDMA NAV GHOSAL. Calcutta, July 1873.
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* I cannot find any recognition of this passage in Lassen. † "Dakhinashar marauya yabacha Bahoola pooree Kalikshetram beejanecyath, &c."