﻿224 ON THE SANSCRIT 



of whicMi the ancient city of Gaur was once the ca- 

 pital ; it still prevails in all the provinces of Bengal, 

 excej)ting perhaps some frontier districts, but is said 

 to be spoken in its greatest purity in tlie eastern 

 parts only ; and, as there spoken, contains fe*>v words 

 which are not evidently dciived from Sanscrit. This 

 dialect has not been neglected by learned men. ]\lany 

 San.scrtt poems have been translated, and some origi- 

 nal poL'nis have been composed in it ; learned Hindus 

 in LJengal speak it almost exclusively ; verbal in- 

 struction in sciences is communicated through this 

 medium, and even publick disputations are conducted 

 in this dialect. Instead of writing it in the Deva- 

 Tiitgarl, as tlie Pracrit and ///V^^/t'r/ are written *, the 

 inhabitants of Bengal have ailopted a peculiar cha- 

 racter, which is nothing else but Deva-nagari, dif- 

 formed for the sake of expeditious writing. Even. 

 the learned amongst them employ this ciiaracter for 

 the Sanscrit language, the pronunciation of which 

 too they in like manner degrade to the Bengal/ stan- 

 dard. The labours of Mr. Halhed and Mr. Fors- 

 TEK have already rendered a knowledge of the ^ew- 

 ^^i// dialect accessible, and Mr. Fouster's further 

 exertions will still more facilitate the acquisition of 

 a language, which cannot but be deemed greatly 

 useful, since it prevails throughout the richest and 

 most valuable portion of the British possessions in 

 India. 



IMait'hila 



nilb from CanSJ. It is difficult to account for this contradiftion. 

 The Gaura Brdhmanas alledge a tradition, that their anceftors mi- 

 grated in the days of the Panda'vas, at the commencement of the pre- 

 sent Call Tiiga. Though no plausible conjecture can be founded on 

 this tradition, yet I am induced to retract a conjecture formerly 

 hazarded by me ; that the Gar of our maps was tlie original country 

 of the Gaura priests. 



* Priicr'tt and Hindi l)ooks are commonly written in the Devatia- 

 gari ; but a corrupt writing, called Nagariy is used by Hindus in all 

 common transactions where H'ludi is employed by them ; and a still 

 more corrupted one, wherein vowels are for the most part omitted, is 



employed 



