4. The modern period, marked by the growth of a prose literature in both dialects, and dating from the beginning of the present century.

1. Early Hindi literature has as yet been very insufficiently explored.· Chand’s Prithwïrâj Räsau is the only specimen of the heroic ballads of which any portion has been published, other ancient metrical chronicles of the same character being known to us only from the use made of them by such writers as Colonel Tod in his Annals of Rajasthan, and Major Pogson in his History of the Boondelas. Chand was the bard of Prithwiräj, the last Hindu king of Dehli, whose life and death he has related. He was himself a native of Lahore, which had for nearly 200 years (since 1023) been under Musulman domination at the time when the poem may be supposed to have been written. His language exhibits a considerable proportion of Persian words, but little of the distinctive features of what is now Panjabi. His work is probably, with the exception of a fragment by Jaideo (the author of the Sanskrit Gita·Govinda), preserved in the Ädi-Granth, the oldest specimen of Hindi which we possess: but it is impossible to suppose that he was the first to attempt poetical composition in that language. The metrical perfection of his verse alone shows that he must have had many predecessors; and rude and rough though his utterance is, it abounds in poetic conventionalisms which must have been the common stock of many singers of his class. The story is told in sixty-nine books, of which some are interludes and digressions, but most are occupied with the exploits of the hero and his warriors. Considering the early date of the poem, and the opportunities of knowing the truth which the author (if he was really Prithwiräj’s bard) possessed, it is remarkable how much legend and fiction is mixed up with history in the chronicle. The repeated conflicts between the räjä and Sultan Shihâbuddîn of Ghor, in which the latter always, except in the last great battle, comes off the worst, and is released on payment of a ransom, seem to be entirely unhistoric, our authorities knowing only one encounter (that of Tirauri near Thänesar, fought in 1191) in which the sultan was defeated, and there even he escaped uncaptured to Lahore. The Mughals (Book xv.) are brought on the stage more than thirty years before they actually set foot iu India (1222), and are related to have been vanquished by the redoubtable Prithwïrâj. These and other points make it questionable whether we have here, at least in its entirety, a genuine contemporary work; but we may concede, as indeed we are justified in doing by the language of the poem, that it is one of our earliest documents in Hindi.

It is very difficult for us now to form a just estimate of Chand’s poem: the language, essentially transitional in character, abounds in strange forms which have long since died out of the vernacular speech; few if any Hindus, even the most learned, are able to interpret him; and his meaning must be sought by investigating the processes by which Sanskrit and Prakrit words have been transfigured in their progress into Hindi. But upon the whole he may be said to exhibit both the merits and defects of ballad-chroniclers in general. There is much that is lively and spirited in his descriptions of fight or council; and the characters of the Räjpüt warriors who surround his.hero are not unfrequently sketched in their own words with skill and animation. The sound, however, too often predominates over the sense, and we find abundantly exemplified in his poem the wearisome iteration, uninventive sameness of machinery, and tedious unfolding of familiar themes and images which distinguish nearly the whole of Indian narrative poetry. His value, for us at least, is linguistic rather than literary.

The other class of composition which is characteristic of the period of Old Hindi, the literature of the Bhagats, both possesses more intrinsic interest and has exercised a more important influence on subsequent literary endeavour. The heroic chronicles, with perhaps the single exception of a famous saga relating the history of Padmävati, wife of Ratan Sen Räjä of Chitor, who in 1303 at the taking of that fortress by Sultan *Ala-ud-din burnt herself and (so says the tale) 13,000 other women rather than fall into the hands of the conqueror, which has been several times handled by poets outside the pale of Rajput traditions, and especially in a still highly esteemed work by Jaisi under Sher Shäh (1540), had only a local currency, and contributed but little to the furtherance of literature outside the limits of Râjpûtânâ. The Vaishnava reformers, on the other hand, exercised the most powerful influence both upon the national speech and upon the themes chosen for poetic treatment. Nearly the whole of subsequent Hindi literature is impressed with one or other form of Vaishnava doctrine; a very large proportion of the poets whose works are still current among the people were Vaishnava saints or bhagats ; and to their initiative is due the almost exclusive use as a poetic dialect of that form of archaic Hindi known as Braj-bhäkhä. Vaishnavism was essentially a reaction against Brahmanical influence and the chains of caste, a claim for the rights of humanity against the monopoly which the “twice-born ’’ asserted of learning, of worship, of righteousness. As Siva was the peculiar deity of the Brahmans, so was Vishnu of the people; and while the literature of the Sai vas and éâktas is almost entirely in Sanskrit, and exercised little or no influence on the popular mind, that of the Vaishnavas is mainly in Hindi, and in itself constitutes the great bulk of what has been written in that language.

The Vaishnava doctrine is commonly carried back to Ramanuja, whose appearance is placed by Wilson about the middle of the 12th century. He was a native of Southern India, and had few immediate followers in the north. In the latter region the new opinions were spread by Rämänand, whom the Bhaktamälä makes the fourth head of the sect, and other authorities the fifth; both Wilson and Trumpp place him about 1400 of our era. Nothing in Hindi by Ramanuja has come down to us; of Rämänand we have one short poem in the Grαηth (Introduction, p. cxxiv.). Between Ramanuja and Rämänand (though not in the line of teachers descending direct from the former) we may place Jaideo (about 1250) and Nämdeo (about 1300), of the first of whom we have a fragment in the Granth, and of the second six pieces have been similarly preserved. Jaideo was a Brahman, and well acquainted with Sanskrit; but Nämdeo (or Nämä) was a chhïpï or calico-printer, a very despised class, and was perhaps the first to proclaim among the followers of the new doctrine the essential unity of mankind as worshippers of Hari. Kabir comes next, and is incomparably the greatest, in the order of Vaishnava teachers. He was a weaver by caste, and in all probability originally a Musalmän. He is counted among the twelve disciples of Rämänand; but he seems himself to trace his spiritual paternity rather to Jaideo and Nämä. He dwelt first at Benares and afterwards at Magahar, in the present district of Gorakhpur, during the reign of Sikandar Shäh Lodi (1488-1517), and was probably dead before the end of the 15th century. Nänak, the first Guru of the Sikhs, whose Granth is little more than a paraphrase of Kabir’s writings, was born in 1469 and died in 1538; and from the relation between the two it seems necessary to suppose that Kabir was several years the senior.

The works attributed to Kabir are very numerous; they are preserved complete at the headquarters of the sect, the Kabir chaura at Benares, and many portions of them have been separately printed and lithographed in India. The best known are those entitled the Sakhis,Sabds, and Rekhtas, which have a wide popularity even among those who are not professed disciples of the saint. Several of the compositions enumerated under the name of Kabir are, however, not by him, but by his disciples: as the lesser Bïjak, by Bhago-Däs, the Sukh-Nidhän, by Srut-Gopäl, &c.; it was the custom (as also that of Kabir’s religious heirs, the Sikh Gurus) for the successors in the guruship to speak in the name of him whose successors they were. The doctrine of Kabir

was philosophically a form of pantheism, accounting for the existence of phenomena (the reality of which was denied) by the agency of a Maya, or illusion, emanating from the Supreme. The varied lot of men in life, their differences of faith and aim, their desires, fears, hopes, loves, are all the work of this Mäyä, to know which, and to recognize beneath all the Supreme, is the only means of emancipation from the chains of illusion. Neither austerities, ritual, nor works of any kind are necessary to obtain the highest end; this is only to be gained by bhakti, li faith,” and perpetual meditation on the Supreme—His names, Hari, Ram, Govind, being ever on the lips and in the heart. The highest end is absorption in the Supreme, reunion with Him from whom all proceeded and who exists in all. Little place is left in this somewhat barren doctrine for a social code, since works are naught; but negatively, at least, it.is inoffensive, commanding respect for all forms of life, and quiet performance of duty without self-seeking or desire for gain.

Of the spiritual followers of Kabir many have left memorials in literature; one of the most eminent of these was Dädü, founder of a sect very prevalent in Räjpütänä. A translation of two chapters from the Granth or scripture of this Bhagat will be found in a note to Wilson’s Religious Sects of the Hindus, pp. 106-113, and will repay perusal. But those whose compositions, if not most excellent from a literary point of view, have at any rate wrought most in history, were the Gurus or spiritual heads of the Sikhs of the Panjâb. The Adi Granth, or Book of the first five Gurus (from Nänak, who died in 1538, to Arjun, who died in 1601), is described by its translator as “perhaps the most shallow and empty book that exists, in proportion to its size;” and certainly the translation is not attractive reading. But the doctrines, reiterated with the most painful diffuseness, are essentially those of Kabir, much of whose writings has been incorporated in the volume. The language is rather Old Hindi than Old Panjabi, and thus the work falls within the scope of this article; though Panjabi words and idioms frequently occur, the grammar is Hindi; and the authors evidently aimed at propagating their tenets rather among the Hindi-speaking races of Hindustan proper than (as actually happened) among the Panjabi-speaking tribes of the West and South-West. The Granth consists of six parts: I., the Japfi, the only portion as yet published in Europe in the original Hindi; II., III., and IV., arrangements for devotional purposes of extracts from Part V., the Rägs or body of the Granth; of these Rags there are thirty-one, but only four, Sm Rag, Majh, Gauri, and Asa, have been rendered by Trumpp; the remaining twenty-seven are described as “a second gathering or gleaning, as materials offered themselves, no attention being paid to the contents, but only to the bulky size of the Granthf VI., the Bhog or conclusion, containing verses by various authors, among them Kabir and Shekh Farid of Pâkpattan, a famous Indian Sufi, and panegyrics of the five Gurus by fifteen bhαtts or bards. At the end of each Räg is a collection of sayings of the Bhagats, chiefly of Kabir, in confirmation of the doctrines set forth by the Gurus; and it is in these additions that the literary importance of the work, as a treasure of specimens of early Hindi, mainly consists.

Another of the following of Rämänand, though consider ably later in time than Kabir, was Sür-Däs. Of his life little is known: as some of his verses are included in the Granth, he must have lived before its redaction (about 1600); if he be the same as a saint of that name mentioned in the Bhaktamalä, as is probable, he was a Brahman, amvn or revenue collector of the parganah of Sandilä in Oudh during the reign of Akbar, who is related to have appropriated the collections of his district for the service of the temple of Madan-Mohan at Brindäban, sending to the treasury instead chests filled with stones. When his delinquency was discovered, he was pardoned by Akbar, but thenceforth abandoned the world, and, becoming blind, led a wandering life as a singer of the praises of Vishnu. His stanzas, generally of four lines (padas), are said to number no less than 125,000; they are collected in a huge volume entitled the Sür-Sägar, and are extremely popular.

While the sects of which Rämänand may be considered the spiritual father adore the Deity chiefly under the names of Rama, Hari, Goviηd, and dwell but little on the avatars or human incarnations of the Hindu god whom they have selected as the type of the Supreme, there is another division of the λ z aishnavas which is not less important in Hindi authorship, and counts its adherents by millions, whose worship is of a different character. The sects belonging to this division take Krishna as their favourite type of the godhead, and, accepting the whole mass of legends (most of them probably of comparatively late origin) relating to this incarnation, inspire themselves with fervour by the contemplation chiefly of Krishna’s childhood and his youth in the society of the herd-maidens of Braj. As the doctrine and object of worship are, so also is the mode of life. The Rämänandis are for the most part men of ascetic and unworldly life, not indeed given to self-torture or needless rigour, but caring nothing for the wealth of the world, and living quietly and soberly in the possession of what they deem the truth. The worshippers of Krishna and his mistress Rädhä, or of the infant Bäl-Gopäl, on the other hand, are no ascetics, but persons of luxurious and often opulent lives; among women especially this form of devotion is widespread. The chief sect of this denomination is the Vallabhächäris, or the following of the Gokulastha Gosaïhs. Their founder was one Vallabha Swâmï, a Brahman from the south, wffio settled at Gokul near Mathurä, probably about the beginning of the 16th century. The best known works of this sect are the Braj-biläs, a description of Krishna’s sports with the maidens of Brindâban, by Brajbäsi-Däs, and the Värttä, a 'collection of legends regarding eighty-four teachers of the following, resembling the Bhaktamälä, which deals chiefly with the other division of Vaishnavas. The popularity of the Brαj- biläs is immense, and it is to be found in a lithographed form for sale in every bazaar. Its contents (as indeed many other productions of the worshippers of Krishna) have been condemned by Europeans as indecent; but although containing much that seems at least outwardly licentious and prurient, it is a work the study of which is indispensable to one who w ould understand the religious temper of the Hindus. The mystic dwelling on the amours of Krishna and the Gοpιt of Braj has been often compared to the mystical interpretation of the Song of Solomon; and in most religions we shall perhaps find at least one phase in which the sensual is curiously mingled with the spiritual, and faith and love towards the heavenly stimulated by thoughts and phrases drawn from earthly scenes of passion. Of the Värttä we shall speak under the next division of our subject.

2. Middle Hindi reaches from about 1570 to 1750. To this age belong the best poets of Hindi literature, Kesav-Däs, Bihäri-Läl, and Tulsi-Däs, whose writings are no less remarkable for skill and subtlety of language than for perfection of metrical form. The labours of their predecessors had wrought the language of western Hindustan into a medium worthy of being put to the highest poetic use; and we accordingly find in the poets of this period large borrowings from Braj, even where (as with Tulsi-Däs) that idiom is not the dialect of their own region. From their day onward Braj-bhäkhä has been esteemed (in the words of Lallü-Läl) “the standard language of sentiment (mahärasa-mül), and equal to the speech of the gods” (ie., Sanskrit).

Kesav-Däs was a Brahman who lived under Jahangir and Shähjahän. He was the author of a poem on Räma, entitled the Rämachandrikä, written in 1602; the Kavi-priya, written in the same year, a treatise on the poetic art of much celebrity; the Rasik-prvyα, on rhetoric, written in 1592: the Bhakta-lllämmta, an exposition of the doctrine of Rämänandi Vaishnavism; and several other works. Kesav-Däs’s compositions are widely popular, and have been frequently lithographed in Northern India.

Bihäri-Läl is renowned as the author of the Sat-sai, a collection of 700 distichs, which is perhaps the most celebrated work of Hindi poetic art, as distinguished from narrative and simpler styles. They are inspired by the Krishna side of Vishnu-worship, and take the form of amorous dialogues between Rädhä and the other Gopns and their lover. The author was a native of Goäliyär, and lived at Amber during the early part of the 17th century. Editions of this work, one of the most difficult in Hindi and abounding in subtle conceits, are very numerous. It has been commented on by a crowd of scholars, among them, strange to say, more than one Musalmän,—a sufficient proof of the value set by natives of India, irrespective of their creed, on its perfection of language. It has even been translated into Sanskrit.

Tulsi-Däs, though perhaps inferior in poetic skill to the two last mentioned, is undoubtedly the most popular Hindi poet. His Rämäyan (originally named by the author Räm- charit-manas, or “the Lake of Räma’s deeds ”) is perhaps better known among Hindus in Upper India than the Bible among the rustic population of England. He was a Kanauji Brahman, and probably (from his language) a native of Oudh. The greater part of his life he spent at Benares; he died in 1624. His Rämäyan was commenced at Ayodhyä in 1573. Besides this great work, he is the author of six other poems, all bearing more or less on the history and worship of Räma, called the Räm-gitävali, the Dohävali, thè Kabit-sambandh, the Binay-patrikä, the Pad- Rämäyan, and the Ghhandavali. Seven other minor works are attributed to him, but their authenticity is doubtful.

Tulsi’s Rämäyan is a rehandling of the great theme of Välmiki, but in no sense a translation of the Sanskrit poem; real translations are scarcely to be found in original Hindi literature, the vernacular authors permitting themselves great liberty of excision, adaptation, and addition. It consists of seven books, of which the first two, called the Bäl-känd and Ayodhyä-känd, make up more than half the work, and relates the birth and boyhood of Räma and his brethren, his marriage with Sitä, their dwelling together in the forest, her abduction by Rävan, the expedition to Lankä and the overthrow of the ravisher, and the life at Ayodhyä after the return of the...

• As the Hindi language consists of many dialects, it is necessary to state that it is the Braj Bhäshä, or the dialect that is spoken in the districts of Agra and Mathura, and in the neighbourhood of Dehli, the ancient capital of the Mahometan empire, which is generally regarded as the parent of Hindustani. The grammatical structure and also a vast number of the commonest vocables of the Braj were incorporated in the new dialect, and to these were added a vast number of Persian, Arabic, and even Turkish words. “Such words, however, in no wise altered or influenced the language itself, which, as regards its inflexional or phonetic elements, remains still a pure Aryan dialect, just as pure in the pages of Wall or Saudä, as it is in those of Tulsi Dâs or Bihârï Läl.” Peculiarities of composition, such as reversing the positions of the governing and the governed word (e.g., häp mera for merä bap), or of the adjective and the substantive it qualifies, or such as the use of Persian phrases with the preposition ba instead of the Hindi postposition of the ablative case (e.g., ba-khushï instead of khushï se, or ba-hzιkm sarkär-ke, instead of sarkar ke hukm se), are no doubt to be met with in many writings, and these, perhaps, combined with the too free indulgence on the part of some authors in the use of high-flown and pedantic Persian and Arabic words in place of common and yet chaste Hindi words, and the general use of the Persian instead of the Nâgarï character, have induced some to regard Hindustani or Urdu as a language distinct from Hindi. But such a view betrays a radical misunderstanding of the whole question.

As regards the introduction of foreign words into the various dialects of Hindi, it seems highly probable that it had its origin at an early period, perhaps as early as the 8th or 9th century of our era. But there is good ground for the opinion that, although the Hindi area was overrun as early as the 12th century, the Hindustani was not formed till the 16th century. “For many generations after the victories of Kutbu’d-din Aibak, the first Musalmän sovereign of Dehli,the conquerors retained their own Persian, and the conquered their Hindi. The Musalmäns had long been accustomed to speak pure Hindi,and it was not they who introduced Persian words into the language, but the Hindüs themselves, who at the epoch above mentioned were compelled by Todar MaΓs new revenue system to learn Persian.” And we learn from Mir Amman of Dehli (whose brief account of the origin of Urdu in the preface to his well-known Bagh-o-Bahär bears on the face of it every convincing mark of probability, and, scanty as it is, is remarkable a«, perhaps, the only attempt at a critical disquisition in the whole range of Hindustani literature) that at the date of the composition of his work (1802) the Musalmän dynasties had endured for a thousand years, and that as intercourse increased the languages of the Hindus and Musalmäns became to a certain extent mixed. By the arrival and stay of the Amir Tïmür the camp or bäzär of the army was introduced into the city, whence the city bäzär was called Urdu, a Tartar word signi Tying “camp.” “When

Akbar ascended the throne, various races from all quarters, on hearing the kind patronage and bounty of that incomparable house, came and assembled in the royal presence, but the speech and dialect of each was different. From their being collected together, and owing to the trade, traffic, and intercourse which they carried on with one another, a single language, that of the Urdu (or Hindustani), was established.”

The epoch of Akbar, which first saw a regular revenue system established, with toleration and the free use of their religion granted to the Hindus, was, there can be little doubt, the period of the formation of the language. But its final consolidation did not take place till the reign of Shah Jahän. After the date of this monarch the changes are comparatively immaterial until we come to the time when European sources began to mingle with those of the East. Of the contributions from these sources there is little to say. Like the greater part of those from the Arabic and Persian, they are chiefly nouns, and may be regarded rather as excrescences which have sprung up casually and have attached themselves to the original trunk than ingredients duly incorporated in the body. In the case of the Persian and Arabic element, indeed, we do find not a few instances in which nouns have been furnished with a Hindi termination, e.g., kharldna, bαdαlηa, guzarnä, däghnä, bαkhshna, kamïnapan, &c. But the European element cannot be said to have at all woven itself into the grammar of the language. It consists, as has been observed, solely of nouns, principally substantive nouns, which on their admission into thelanguage are spelt phonetically, or according to the corrupt pronunciation they receive in the mouths of the natives, and are declined like the indigenous nouns by means of the usual postpositions or case-affixes. A few examples will suffice. The Portuguese, the first in order of seniority, contributes a few words, as kamαra or kαmra (camera), “a room;” martοl, “a hammer:” nilam, “auction” (often corrupted into lilam); peril, “a turkey,” &c. <kc. Of French and Dutch influence scarcely a trace exists. English has contributed a number of words, some of which have even found a place in the literature of the language; e.g., Kammishanar (commissioner); jaj (judge) ; istant (assistant); dakfαr (doctor) ; dαkfari, “the science of medicine,” or “the profession of physicians;” inspektar (inspector); sosayafl (society); aρll (appeal); aphl kamιa, “to appeal;” dikrι or digri (decree); digri (degree); inch (inch); fut (foot); and many more, are words now commonly used. How far the free use of Anglicisms will be adopted as the language progresses is a question upon which it would be hazardous to pronounce an opinion.

The grammatical structure of the Hindustani differs in no essential particular from that of the Hindi from which it is sprung. . It is therefore of the rise and formation of this language, and of the stage to which it had attained when the new phase of the Hindustani was developed from it, that we shall now speak.

Of the history and development of the Hindi or Hindùi language previous to the 11th century of our era little or nothing is known. It is accepted as a fact by most scholars that Sanskrit ceased to be a vernacιdar in the 6th century B.c., when the Buddhist religion was founded, which for ten centuries drove Brahmanism into obscurity. From that time the Aryan people of India spoke popular dialects called Prakrits, and it is from these that the modern Aryan tongues are mainly derived. These Prakrit dialects are generally grouped under five heads, viz., the Maharâshtrï, Sauraseni, Mägadhi, Paisachi, and Apabhransa. Of these the Sauraseni, or dialect of Saurasena, the modern tract of Mathura and the surrounding country, is taken to be the parent of the Hindi, or at any rate of that phase of it with which we have to do. These Prakrits were, like the Sanskrit, synthetical and inflexional in their structure, and certainly continued to be so up to the 1st century of our era, the lowest stage to which in point of development scholars have been able to reach. At what precise period the synthetical structure of the Prakrit began to break up and to give place to the analytical formations of the modern speech it is impossible to tell. The gap of nine centuries has yet to be filled up. And unless future discoveries of Buddhistic literature should shed light on the subject, it is to be feared that the history of this period will ever remain unknown.

The dawn of modern Hindi may be dated from the 11th century. The earliest known writer in the language was Chand Bardai (c.1200), whose epic is in a dialect rude and half-formed, but as decidedly analytical as the Hindi of the present day. Much of the old synthetical structure no doubt is still to be found in the work; the particles and the auxiliary verbs are in a very crude and unformed state (as, for example, the use of an obscure ka for the modern genitive affix ka, which ka does not vary with the governed noun, and is frequently left out altogether; the total absence of the ordinary substantive verb hai, &c.); but these crudities and remnants of old Prakrit forms do not affect the general structure. Indeed, they are to be found in writings of a much later period, in works belonging to the 14th and 15th centuries, e.q., in the Adi Grαnth, the language of which exhibits, according to Trumpp, “grammatical forms not firmly fixed, but rather in a state of transition.” And although the forms assume greater fixity, and marked progress is observable in the works of later writers in the Braj Bhâkhâ dialect, e.g., in those of Kabir, Sür Das, Nabhä Ji, Kesava Das, and Bihäri Läl (whose poems are, as a rule, composed in very pure and elegant Hindi), we still find certain crudities and traces of Prakrit forms and organic structure, and these continue even in the language of the present day.

To give a minute account of the grammatical formation, to indicate the various phonetic or glottic laws by the operation of which the vocables and grammatical forms of the Hindi are derived from those of the Prakrit or Sanskrit, is beyond the scope of the present article. We can but notice a few general laws, and exhibit results, so far as they have been ascertained. For closer acquaintance with the subject we must refer the reader to the Präkrit- Prakαsa of Vararûchi, edited by Professor E. B. Cowell; the Prakrit Grammar of Hemachandra, edited by Professor Pischel; the Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India, by John Beames, B.C.S.; and Essays on the Gaurian Languages, by Professor Rudolf Hoernle.

Prakrit tolerates no compound consonant in the beginning and no dissimilar consonant in the middle of a word. Two dissimilar consonants in a Sanskrit word are changed in Prakrit to two similar consonants, and occasionally one of these is elided and the preceding vowel lengthened. In the modern dialects this elision of one consonant and compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel is the rule. Prakrit either changes a medial surd mute consonant to the corresponding sonant one, or elides it altogether; and it generally changes an aspirate mute consonant to the simple aspirate h. In fact the modern Aryan tongues stand to the Prakrit and the Sanskrit in a relation very similar to that existing between the Italian, <fcc., and the Romance and Latin languages. Hindi “is not the daughter of Sanskrit, as we find it in the Vedas, or in the later literature of the Brahmans, it is a branch of the living speech of India, springing from the same stem from which Sanskrit sprang when it first assumed its literary independence.” Vocables.— The vocables may be classed under three heads :— 1. Words which are pure Sanskrit, as râjâ, “a king”; pita, “father”; kaνi, “ a poet”; nagari, “of or belonging to a city”; karma, kärya, “work”; krodha (vulg. krodh), “anger.” Nota few of this class of words have existed in the language for some centuries; some are to be found even in the oldest specimens of the literature; but by far the larger number have passed into the language during the present century, and the introduction is still progressing. The form in which they appear is that of the Sanskrit nominative singular.

2. Words which are derived from the Prakrit, and have been considerably changed in the process, though not so much as to obscure their origin, e.g., käm, “work,” Prk. kamma, S. karma; kän, “ear,” Prk. kanιιa, S. karna; ath, “eight,” Prk. attlιa, S. ashtha; hath, “hand,” Prk. haitha, S. hasta ; äp, “self,” Prk. appâ, S. âtmâ; bât, “word,” Prk. vattä, S. värttä ; âj, “today,” Prk. ajja, S. adya; âge, “before,” Prk. agge, S. agre; äg, “fire,” Prk. aggi, S. agni; dudh, “milk,” Prk. duddha, S. dugdha; phägun, “Feb.-March,” Prk. phaggun, S. ρhalgun; budclhä, “old,” Prk. vudclho, S. vriddhah; kalιa, “said,” (Braj kahyau), Prk. kahido, kahio, S. kathitah; rahä, “remained,” (Braj rahyauh, Prk. rahido, rahio, S. rahitah; thä, ‘ ‘ was,” Prk. thio, S. sthitah. This is by far the largest class of words in the Hindi. And, as in the case of the first class, they are adopted in the form of the nominative singular of the Prakrit. They are divisible into two classes, the first comprising such as have in their declension preserved traces of the old organic inflexion of the Prakrit declension, and the second those which have preserved no such traces. As regards these it may be observed that the terminations a, e, i, o, u, of the Prakrit are regularly reduced in the Hindi to their inherent simple vowels, viz., â to a, e and i to i, and o and u to u ; and these short vowels are, as a rule, made quiescent, so that a word ending in reality in a short vowel virtually terminates in a consonant; and, not being pronounced, the final short vowel is frequently suppressed in writing also.

3. Words which cannot apparently he traced to any Sanskrit original, and are therefore considered by some scholars as words of non-Aryan origin; e.g., pagri, ii turban”; gor, Prk. goram, “ leg.” Such words form but a small proportion; and it is probable that further research and a better acquaintance with the laws of development of the modern Aryan tongues will ultimately enable scholars to very much diminish their number.

Gender.— The three genders of the Prakrit and Sanskrit are, in Hindi and Hindüstäni, reduced to two, the neuters and masculines of the old tongues generally becoming masculines in the modern language. Instances, however, are not a few in which they are changed to feminines. A striking feature in the modern tongues is the preponderance of masculines ending in d, with the corresponding feminines in i. Now in the Sanskrit d is a typical feminine ending, and i is as often a masculine as a feminine termination. Many feminine words ending in ά are no doubt to be found in the Hindi, aschhimä, “patience,” = S. kshamâ ; and similarly many masculine words which in the Prakrit and Sanskrit terminate in i are also to be met with, as pdni, “water,”≈S. päniyam ; hâlhï, “elephant,” = S. hasti (hastin'). But â is typically a masculine and i a feminine termination in the Hindi and Hindüstäni, and this is probably due to the number of sources from which the termination springs; thus we have—(1) α=Prk. o, =S. as or ah, e.g., kaisd, “like what,” “what manner,” “how,” Prk. kériso, S. kidri&ah; (2) d=Prk. αδ, =S. akas or akah, e.g., ghord, “horse,” Prk. ghoraö, S. ghotakah ; (3) α = Prk. a(k)am, aam,≈S. am, e.g., keld, “ plantain,” Prk. kera(k)am, keradm, S. kadaram. Again, the masculine ending aka of the old languages has a corresponding feminine in ikd ; and as the Prakrit commonly employs the pleonastic increment k to raise bases to the form aka, so it employs the same affix to form the feminine ikd of these masculines; ikd becomes iyd, and more commonly i in the modern tongues. The form iyd is that which is generally used in feminine diminutives; e.g., dibiyd, “a tiny box”; but it is also used like i for a simple feminine; e.g., kuttd, “dog,” kutiyd, “bitch”; bûrhâ, “ old man,” burhiyd, “old woman.” If to the above class of feminines ending in i be added the large class which in Prakrit and Sanskrit form the feminine in i (i.e., the Prakrit masculines in o, = S. as), the preponderance of nouns ending in i seems sufficiently accounted for. It may be added thatα and i are so universally regarded as masculine and feminine terminations respectively that the natives employ them freely in forming feminines from masculinesand vice versa, e.g., badld, badli, from the Arabic badak There are a few other feminine terminations which are worthy of notice, not so much on account of their origin (which presents no difficulty), as on account of the free use which is made of them; these are—(1) ini, in, an, ni, ==S. ini (fem. of in, ι); (2) äni, äni, dln, = S. dnL These are not only found in words derived from the Prakrit, but are added to Persian and even Arabic words; e.g., hdthini, hdthin, hathni, “female elephant,” ( = S. hastini); sundrin, sundran, “a goldsmith’s wife,” (fem. of sonar, “goldsmith,” = S. suvarnakdra); sherni, “ tigress,” from the Persian sher, “ tiger ’; nasiban, a proper name, from the Arabic ?iasib; panclitdni, “the wife of a pandit”; chaudhrdin, “ the wife of a chaudhari or head-man”; méhtrdnï, “ the wife of a sweeper, a sweeper-woman,” from the Persian mêhtar, “a sweeper.”

Declension.— It is here that the most striking contrast between the old and the new languages is found. The synthetical method of the Prakrit and the Sanskrit is, as a whole, rejected, only certain half-effaced traces of declension being retained. The number of cases, as in the Sanskrit, is seven, the nominative, accusative, instrumental, dative, ablative, genitive, locative, and vocative; but the inflexions of the Prakrit have given place to case-affixes or postpositions. F or example, where the Sanskrit has sivdyai and sivasyai, the Hindi has siv-ko, and siv-kd.

The case-affixes or postpositions are as follow :— [table]

The genitive affix, it may be observed, varies its termination so as to agree with the governing noun. In other words, it is adjectival, and agrees with the governing noun just as an adjective would; e.g., sone·kigharl, “ a gold watch.”

The case-affixes or postpositions are all, there can be no doubt, remnants of Prakrit nouns which were probably in use at the period when the modern Aιyan languages began to be formed. The majority of these are fairly determined, and it seems probable that the remainder will also be fixed before long. The results of the investigation of scholars, as regards the postpositions noticed above (which are those commonly employed in the declension of Hindi and Hindüstäni nouns), we will here attempt to exhibit.

The case-affix ne of the instrumental (or case of the agent) is regarded by Trumpp and others as derived from ena, the instrumental case-ending of the Sanskrit. This opinion is, however, combated by Beames (Comp. Gram., vol. ii. p. 266 et seq.), who is of opinion that it is an affix of the dative, which was probably transferred to the instrumental as late as the time of Shäh Jahän, in whose reign, as has been shown above, Urdü or Hindüstäni λvas consolidated. Beames shows that the postposition is not used in the old Hindi, and is not to be found in most of the dialects, except as a dative ∙, but he does not, we believe, trace it to any particular original. It is clear, however, that whether this affix is derived from the instrumental case-ending of the Sanskrit or not, it bears a striking resemblance to the latter in its use and the construction it requires; e.g.. the Sanskrit tena uktam is marvellously like the Hindi us-na kahä, “by him it was said,” or freely “he said.”

The dative postposition ko is derived by Dr Trumpp from the Präkrit kito, kio,≈S. kritam. Dl∙ Hoernle, however, would seem to connect it with the Bangäli kächhe “ near,” and the S. sa-kdsa; and Beames (Comp. Gram., vol. ii. p. 257), accepting this as a right clue, traces the affix to the Präkrit kakkham, = S. kaksham, “ armpit,” “side," the locative of which, kakshe, he believes to be the source of the Bangäli kächhe.

The postposition se of the ablative is traced by Beames (Comp. Gram., vol. ii. p. 274) to the Sanskrit samam, “ with,” through an old form soil still used in the rustic dialects.

The genitive case-affix kd (fem. ki, oblique ke) is derived by Trumpp and others...