54 Dr. Hoernle — Remarks on Birch Baric MS. [April, 



The Secretary reported the death of Dr. Otakara Feistmantila^ a 

 foreign member of the Society. 



The President read a circular from the Royal Society of New South 

 Wales, enumerating prizes to be given for original researches on certain 

 subjects connected with Australia. 



Dr. A. F. Rudolf Hoernle again exhibited the old birch bark MS., 

 brought by Lieut. Bower from Kashgaria, and made the following 

 remarks concerning it : 



" This MS. was first shown to the Society in November last, in the 

 Proceedings of which month an account of its acquisition by Lieut. 

 Bower is printed. That account appears to have been reprinted in 

 the Bomhay Gazette, a copy of which accidentally fell into my hands 

 in Aden on my way out to India in March last. It was the first 

 notice I had of it; Major Cumberland, wbose companion Lieut. 

 Bower had been on his travels, was a fellow-passenger of mine and 

 gave me corroborative information ; all this made me very anxious to see 

 the MS. On my reaching Calcutta I was very glad to find that the MS. 

 was still in the possession of Colonel Waterhouse, who very kindly 

 at once made it over to me for examination. 



" The MS. has been with me only a little more than a week, and my 

 examination of it, of course, is not yet finished ; but I have already been 

 able to determine several important points ; and as hitherto it has been 

 impossible to ascertain anything about the character and contents of the 

 manuscript, I will not delay communicating my information, though 

 further examination may possibly induce me to modify it on some minor 

 points. 



" The first point that strikes one on looking through the MS. is, that 

 it appears to be written in three, if not four, different styles. This 

 point has been already noticed in the November account. But what 

 is more, — the difference is not (as may seem at first sight) merely one 

 of careful and slovenly writing, but one of variety of alphabet. The 

 whole manuscript is written in what Mr. Fleet (in his Gupta Inscriptions 

 in Volume III of the Corpus Inscriptionum Lidicarum, p. 3) distin- 

 guishes as the Northern class of the Nagari alphabet, which is charac- 

 terised by the peculiar form of the m. Of this class, however, 

 three varieties are observable in the MS. The test-letter of these 

 varieties is the palatal s, which is formed in three different ways. The 

 first of them, with a rounded top, is that commonly used in the 

 Northern Oupta inscriptions ; the other two closely approach the form 



