I.

NOTES AND NEWS.

Life of Sir William Wilson Hunter, K. C. S. I., M. A., L. L. D., etc. by Francis Henry Skrine, F. S. S. This biography offers a striking example of the success of a life devoted steadily and unflinchingly to one end. What that end was is best told in Sir William Hunter's own words. Writing to Mr. Kipling in 1888, he says: "I know what my work in life is, and I turn neither to the left nor right for praise or blame. Twenty years ago I saw what that work was first to enable England to learn India's needs, next to help England to think fairly of India, and finally to make the world feel the beauty and pathos of Indian life." That he fulfilled this aim with no small measure of success will be admitted by those best qualified to judge. This book affords a faithful record of the process. Thanks to Mr. Skrine's judicious and skilful handling of the wealth of material at his disposal, we are enabled to realise vividly the various phases in Hunter's busy life; his early struggles for success; his steady progress despite illness, worry, and the intrigues of colleagues jealous of his fame; his later triumphs, and the career which opened out to him after his final return to England. His early character, as revealed in the spontaneous outpourings of his heart in letters and diaries, is that of a sensitive, ardent, and joyous nature, delighting in life and all its gifts. There is no trace of Puritanical sourness, though to the Puritan influences of his early training is doubtless due that tinge of religious fervour noticeable here and there in his youthful utterances. From the moment of his landing in India, practically unknown and with his future in his own hands, his industry never flagged. One lesson to be learnt from his biography is the necessity for rigid self-restraint in India. Repeatedly in his letters and diaries Hunter recurs to this, and these records of his daily life prove how strenuously he practised what he preached. Probably nobody unacquainted with the tropics can fully appreciate what a struggle this involves and how fatally easy is the first step to self-indulgence. When to the discomforts of climate we add the illness which he had so frequently to combat, the work Hunter got through is simply marvellous. Doubtless the stern upbringing of his Scottish home, which he rather tended to resent, did much to foster this keen devotion to duty. His never faltering ambition counted for much in the struggle; but what probably contributed in no small degree to his success was that vein of practical shrewdness or hard-headedness which accompanied his other gifts. Though undoubtedly a man of feeling, he probably at no time let his heart rule his head to his own disadvantage. It is just the lack of this faculty which explains in many instances the failure of highly gifted natures;

and it is just such a faculty exhibited by a man like Hunter, which puzzles and perplexes those who seek to explain his character by a more simple formula. Another factor in his success was the finding of a completely untrodden field for his energies, and one peculiarly suited to his own special gifts. His diaries and letters enable us to realise how strong was the spell cast on his imagination by the scenes amid which he wandered while collecting material for his early works on Bengal and Orissa. Hunter belonged, as indeed he was almost bound to do, to that class who see great beneficence in England's rule in India. To make that rule as efficient as possible, to repair mistakes, to remove grievances was the constant aim of his life. The idea of questioning its beneficial influence, or of hinting at its futility seems never to have occurred to him. Yet it needs only the perusal of such a book as Meredith Townsend's "Asia and Europe", to see how slight are our grounds for believing that our civilisation, our culture or our religion are leaving any permanent stamp on this congeries of empires whose civilisation was hoary when ours was yet unborn. Hunter's support of the Ilbert Bill, though consistent with the rest of his policy, seems to show that he underrated, or failed to grasp the significance of that race-hatred on which Townsend lays so much stress as one of the chief obstacles to our success in the East. Probably he was of too practical and optimistic a nature to be influenced by such views. Without a strong faith, too, in that for which he is working, no man can be a success, and faith in England's Empire in India was the inspiration of all Hunter's efforts at home and abroad. His suggestions for reform were many, and some-notably those on famine control, and his plea for the establishment of technical schools-were eminently practical, and the result of wide and personal knowledge of the needs they were designed to supply. It is perhaps on his success in the third of his self-allotted tasks that Hunter's eventual fame will rest-his endeavour to make England feel the beauty and the pathos of Indian life. His quick sympathies and magic style lent a charm to all he wrote on Indian subjects, a charm found only in the highest literature. Other schools of political thought may arise, the growth of fresh materials will render obsolete, while new researches will lead to the revision of much of the work on which some of the best years of his life were spent, but in the subtle charm which pervades "The Old Missionary" and the deft touches with which he constructs a dead past in "Orissa" and "The Annals of Rural Bengal" we have a permanent relic of his personality, a proof that now and again Britain can produce a man responsive to the needs, and in sympathy with the feelings, of peoples wide as the poles asunder from her own. Mr. Skrine has done his work well. Out of the copious diaries and numerous correspondence he has made just such selections as are necessary to the understanding of Hunter's character, his views, and his attitude towards the various political problems concerning India, the solution of which absorbed his thoughts and his energies to the last. (See p. 37).

We have received the first of two volumes on Esoteric Hinduism which will form

Nos. II and III of the 'Awaking of India' series. The book before us, with the special title of Popular Hinduism, consists of a series of short dissertations on subjects connected with Indian religions, mostly by members of the Theosophical Society. Theosophy is a noble word, and, rightly understood, may well stand for the highest truth, but these rambling and imperfect essays on such topics as mythology, magic, ceremonies, astrology and caste-marks are not calculated to convince the Western world of the eternal validity of Hinduism. Judging by the Preface we suspect that the compiler has had no better presentation of Christianity than he here gives us of Hinduism, which is much to be deplored. Lastly, why do not theosophists transliterate the beautiful language of ancient India with scientific accuracy, instead of giving us such monstrosities as Stoolasarira and Eswara ? (See p. 52).

The elementary Sanskrit Grammar most generally used in this country in recent years has been undoubtedly, Prof. Macdonell's abridgement of Max Müller's Sanskrit Grammar. This work has been for some time out of print, and its place is now filled by what is practically a new book by the same writer, entitled 'A Sanskrit Grammar for Beginners'. The improvements which have been carried out in this new work are evident on every page. The unsightly system of transliteration adopted in the Sacred Books of the East' has been abandoned in favour of the system used in the: "Grundriss der Indo-Arischen Philologie" and nearly all important modern Sanskrit works. The arrangement of the paradigms and the statement of the rules are more complete and at the same time, more concise; and there is much important additional matter, notably an introductory sketch of the history of Sanskrit Granimar, and an appendix summarising the main differences between Vedic and classical Sanskrit. This new Grammar will amply suffice for the needs of those students whose object is to obtain a working knowledge of Sanskrit whether for literary or philological purposes, and, at the same time, it will prove an admirable stepping-stone to the more advanced grammatical treatises. (See p. 36).

The third volume of Vedische Studien by Professors Pischel and Geldner is a worthy successor of the two which have already appeared. This series of notes dealing with the grammatical and epexegetical interpretation of the Veda is well known to all serious Vedic students. It constitutes a mine of information, and represents the results of the most recent and enlightened Vedic criticism. The translations, with notes, of six Vedic hymns by Prof. Geldner are particularly valuable. (See Vol. XII, p. 265).

Vol. IV of Studi Italiani di Filologia Indo-Iranica is entirely occupied with the subject of Indian geography from the very earliest times down to the Persian and Arabic writers. The main account is by the editor of the ,,Studi", Prof. J. L. Pullé of Florence, and this is supplemented by a number of appendices by Signori Mario Longhena and Alberto Trauzzi and illustrated by a number of maps prepared by the great cartographer, the late Henry Kiepert,

to whose memory the volume is dedicated. Altogether we have here what has been long wanted a summary of such Indian geographical lore as can be gathered from ancient and mediaeval writers other than the Chinese, whose accounts, from their greater importance, have already received considerable attention. Of particular interest, perhaps, are Prof. Pullé's second chapter on the geographical notices in the literature of India itself the epics, the puranas, the astrological treatises etc. and Signor Longhena's investigation of the Kurmavibhāga in Varāhamihira's Brhatsamhitā. (See p. 47).

Prof. F. Kielhorn, of Göttingen, has reprinted his edition of the 'Bruchstücke Indischer Schauspiele in Inschriften zu Ajmere' which he contributed to the 'Festschrift zur Feier des 150-jährigen Bestehens der Königl. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen 1901'. These inscriptions, four in number, are on slabs of basalt and were discovered about twenty-five years ago in the Arhai-din-ka Jkonpra Mosque at Ajmere, where they are still preserved. Two of them contain considerable portions of the Lalitavigraharāja-Nataka written by Somadeva in honour of the Cahamāna king Vigraharaja of Sakhambhari, and the other two considerable portions of the Harakeli-Nataka written by Vigraharaja himself in honour of the god Siva. The date given at the end of the latter corresponds to 22 Nov. 1153 A. D., and a mention in the former of an expedition of Vigraharaja against the Turuskas (Muhammadans) makes it certain that this king is to be identified with the Visaladeva-Vigraharāja of whom we have an inscription dated in the year 1164 A. D. These interesting inscriptions strikingly illustrate the great importance for Indian literature and history of the study of Indian epigraphy which Prof. Kielhorn has done so much to promote. (See p. 43).

Mr. G. A. Grierson, the Director of the Linguistic Survey of Northern India, has reprinted a 'Note on the principal Rājasthānī Dialects' which he contributed to the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for October 1901. Rajasthani, the prevailing vernacular in Rajputānā and adjacent districts of the Panjab and Central Provinces, may be described as intermediate between Western Sindi and Gujarati. It has numerous local variations, of which Dr. Grierson mentions sixteen as of sufficient importance to be regarded as real dialects. But these all fall into four main groups Mewati, Malwī, Jaipuri, and Marwari. Dr. Grierson's tables contain examples of the nominal and verbal inflexions in these chief groups, and, for purposes of comparison, parallel forms from Braj and Bundēlī, the most closely related dialects of Western Hindi, and from Gujarati. (See p. 35).

Die Buddha-legende in den Skulpturen des Tempels von Boro-Budur, by C. M. Pleyte, is an interesting contribution to the history of Northern Buddhist art. The temple of Boro-Budur, the chief architectural monument of the Buddhist Church in Java, dates probably from the period c. 850-900 A. D., a time at which Buddhism had almost decayed in the land of its birth, but continued to flourish vigourously in the foreign countries to which bas-reliefs, it had been transplanted. This temple is adorned with numerous

illustrating the life of the Buddha as given in the chief Northern biography of him, the Lalita-vistara. The author of the present work has appended to some excellent line-engravings of these bas-reliefs, a full description of each, together with a continuous account of Buddha's life according to the Lalitavistara. He also gives, in his introduction, an account of the temple itself. (See Vol. XII, p. 265).

Mr. A. M. B. Irwin's monograph, The Burmese Calendar, is likely to be of real value to those interested in this perplexing subject. The Burmese solar year (365 days, 6 hours, 12 min., 36 sec. mean time) begins theoretically with the entrance of the sun into Aries. To equate this with the lunar year of 354 days an intercalation of 30 days is made 7 times in the 19-years' cycle, and a day is also added occasionally; and the irregularities in this procedure lead to great confusion. Mr. Irwin does much to clear up this darkness, and suggests some desirable reforms. The book contains, after the text, a tabular calendar for 1739-2000 A. D., tables for the calculation of the Solar NewYear's Day and the intercalated months, and tables of the months from 1739 to 1901, etc. (See p. 35).

The work briefly and modestly recounted in Dr. M. A. Stein's Preliminary Report on a Journey of Archaeological and Topographical Exploration in Chinese Turkestan is epoch-making. Dr. Stein has traced in Khotan the remains of a rich Buddhist culture lasting down to the 8th century, and actually transported and lodged in the British Museum a mass of relics of this civilisation-objects of art, manufacture, and, most important of all, many hundreds of official documents in Kharosti and fragmentary religious Mss. in Brahmi etc. Moreover he has made many valuable topographical and historical observations, e. g. determining the longitude of Khotan by connecting it with the trigonometrical system of the Indian Surveys, and fixing the sites of many ancient centres of culture. He started in June 1900 from Gilgit, and entered Chinese soil in the Taghdumbāsh Pāmir, thence passing to the centre of the Sarīkol district, Jashkurghan (which he identifies with Ptolemy's Lithinos Pyrgos), and thence to Kashgar. Khotan town (Ilchi) was reached on Oct. 12. The village of Yotkan, 7 miles west of it, which he identifies with the ancient capital, yielded some valuable relics of the Gandhara style of art. Thence he went to Dandan Uilig, a desert site, in which were found stucco images, frescoes of style resembling the later Ajanta paintings, Sanskrit Mss. in old Brahmi script of the Gupta type, relics of a non-Indian language in the same script, Chinese Mss., painted tablets, etc. The ruins of a settlement on the Nyga River yielded also rich treasures over 500 documents on wood in Kharosthi script, many official, and about 24 of the same on leather, frescoes, relics of wood-carving in the Gandhara style, etc. confirming the local tradition that Khotan was colonised at an early date from the Panjab. The clay seals on many wooden tablets display a classical art that came doubtless from both Bactria and the Gandhāra region. In the ruins of the Kōne shahr' of Endere were found remains of stucco sta