1875.] Babu Kajendralal — Beport on Sanskrit MSS. 67 



time immemorial used as materials for books, and for durability they stand 

 unrivalled ; but I have never seen mention in Indian works of parchment 

 or dressed skin of any kind as material for writing ; and palimpsests are of 

 course unknown. 



Pens. — 9. According to the Yogini Tantra, bamboo twigs and bronze 

 styles are unfortunate, and gold and reeds are the best for pens ; but the 

 universal practice among the Pandits of Bengal is to use the bamboo twig 

 for pens, and only rich householders employ the vrinnala or hlidhrd reed. 

 In the North Western Provinces, the reed or calamus, whence the Indian 

 word Jcalama, is generally used, and bamboo pens are all but unknown. The 

 latter, however, when well- prepared is much more elastic and durable, and 

 it has the further and supreme advantage of being every where procurable 

 Avithout any cost. Crow-quills were formerly used for writing very small 

 characters for amulets, but never for ordinary manuscripts. In Orissa, 

 where letters are scratched and not written on palm-leaves, an iron style 

 with a pointed end and a fiat top every where replaces the bamboo twig and 

 the calamus reed. 



Ordinary ink. — 10. The ink used for writing puthis is of two kinds ; 

 one fit for paper and the other for palm-leaves. The former is made by 

 mixing a coffee-coloured infusion of roasted rice with lampblack, and then 

 adding to it a little sugar, and sometimes the juice of a plant called hesurte 

 (Verbesina scandens). The labour of making this ink is great, for it 

 requires several days' continued trituration in a mortar before the lampblack 

 can be thoroughly mixed with the rice infusion, and want of sufficient tritu- 

 ration causes the lampblack to settle down in a paste, leaving the infusion 

 on top unfit for writing with. Occasionally acacia gum is added to give a 

 gloss to the ink, but this practice is not common, sugar being held sufficient 

 for the purpose. Of late an infusion of the emblick myrobolan prepared in 

 an iron pot has occasionally been added to the ink, but the tannate and 

 gallate of iron formed in the course of preparing this infusion are injurious 

 to the texture of paper, and Persian MSS., sometimes written with such 

 ink, suffer much from the chemical action of the metallic salts. 



The ink for palm-leaf consists of the juice of the hesurte mixed with a 

 decoction of dltd. It is highly esteemed, as it sinks into the substance of 

 the leaf, and cannot be washed off. Botli the inks are very lasting, and, 

 being perfectly free from mineral substances and strong acids, do not in any 

 way injure the substance of the paper or leaf on which it is applied. They 

 never fade, and retain their gloss for centuries. 



Coloured ink. — 11. To mark the ends of chapters and for writing 

 rubrics, colophons and important words on paper, an ink made of cinnabar, 

 or alta, is sometimes used, and in correcting errors the usual practice is to 

 apply on the wrong letters a colour made of yellow or red orpiment ground 



