268 E. C. Bayley — On a forged Pdli Inscrqjtion. [Dec. 



more, and such a record could be easily prepared. Dr. Mitra was of opinion 

 that some one who had got hold of a copy of Prinsep's plate of the Lat al- 

 phabet, had got up the record to impose upon Mr. Smith. In Prinsep's time 

 the Pali numerals had not been discovered. It was only the other day that 

 General Cunningham discovered only a few, and as this was not known to 

 the forger, he was driven to the necessity of using the Sanskrit figures 

 slightly altered. It seemed, too, that the man knew nothing of the Bharrs 

 until he saw the name in English letters. In Sanskrit and Hindi the word 

 is, and should be, written with the ^ with a dot under it, to mark its pecu- 

 liar sound. In English this cannot be reproduced, and the usual practice 

 is, to write the word with two t& at the end. In Sanskrit this double r 

 is never permitted ; but, having seen it in English with a double r, the writer 

 at once copied it in the Pali character, and in a Sanskrit document. He had 

 to prove his statement before an Englishman, and, apprehending lest the use 

 of the dotted ^ should lead to doubts, *he sacrificed Sanskrit grammar, and 

 the usage of the country. It might be asked what would be the object of 

 such a piece of imposition ? But from the days of Wilf ord there have been 

 so many attempts of the kind made by Pandits, that it is scarcely neces- 

 sary to dwell upon it at length. The smile of a Sahib of high rank and the 

 rewards expected are quite sufficient to account for such wicked acts. 



The Peesident said after the very clear statement made by Dr. Raj- 

 endra Lai, for which the Society was much indebted to him, there could be 

 no doubt that the bronze plate in question was an impudent forgery. It 

 was almost superfluous to multiply proofs in addition to those brought for- 

 ward, but at least it was fair to ask why, if the ancient character was preserved 

 the ancient numerals were not preserved also, and why with the char- 

 acters of 250 B, 0. were associated not the numerals of that date but the 

 numerals of to-day ? 



Again the transliteration gave, not perhaps good Sanskrit, but at least 

 intelligible sense, certain errors being overlooked. Still it seemed to the 

 President very difficult to get the transliteration somewhat differently 

 from the text of the plate ; the very first letter of the first line might possibly 

 be read as " go", but it was more like " ta." Moreover, unless the writer 

 was very unversed in the character he used, the " dhavya" in the third line 

 would surely have the vowel mark attached to the " y" rather than to the 

 first letter of the compound, and the President thought that a scribe of 

 Asoka's date would have written the " marhavirrya" of the transliteration. 



Without going further, it seemed only too probable that the plate was pro- 

 duced from the transliteration, and not tlie transliteration from the j^late, and 

 that Mr, Vincent Smith had unfortunately stumbled upon a Hindu " Simonides." 



The reading of the following paper was postponed — 

 Pali Studies. No. 2. Vuttodaya. By Major G. E. Fbyek, Deputy 

 Commissioner, British Burma. 



