252 AN ESSAY ON THE 



class, which were not numerous, but of the great- 

 est importance in their nature ; and as books in 

 India are not bound as in Europe, and every leaf 

 is loose, he took out one or two leaves, and sub- 

 stituted others with an adulterous legend. In 

 books of some antiquity it is not uncommon to see 

 a few new leaves inserted in the room of others 

 that were wanting, 



To conceal his impositions of the third class, 

 which is the most numerous, he had the patience 

 to write two voluminous sections, supposed to be- 

 long one to the Scanda purana, and the other to 

 the Brahman'da, in which he connected all the le- 

 gends together, in the usual style of the Puranas, 

 These two sections, the titles of which he bor- 

 rowed, consist, as he wrote them, of no less than 

 112,000 Slocas, or lines. The real sections are so 

 very scarce, that they are generally supposed to 

 be lost, and probably are so, unless they are to be 

 found in the library of the Rajah of Jayanagar. 

 Other impostors have had recourse to the Scanda, 

 Brahmanda, and Fadma-puranas, a great part of 

 which is not at present to be found ; and for that 

 reason, these are called the Purdnas of thieves or 

 impostors ; though the genuineness of such parts as 

 are in common use has never been questioned. 

 — Some persons attempted, by such means, to de- 

 ceive the famous Jayasinha, and the late Ticat- 

 RAYA, prime minister of the Nabob of Oude. 

 They were discovered, lost their places and ap- 

 pointmenti), and were disgraced. 



j\Iy chief pandit certainly had no idea, in the 

 first instance, that he should be driven to such ex- 

 tremities. I used (as already remarked) to trans- 

 late the extracts which he made for me, by way of 

 exercise; and never thought, at that time, of 

 comparing them with the originals ; first, because 



