168 Dr. Mitra— -Om Ekutihlidva. [July, 



proposal seems to him to be ' quite untenable.' He does not, however, 

 condescend to give any reason for this demurrer. In my note I showed 

 that the two words eka and iiti were as old as the Sanhita of the Rig 

 Veda ; that they had been frequently used in Sanskrit literature ; that 

 their union was in perfect accord with the rules of Sanskrit Grammar ; 

 and that the meaning they produced by the union was exactly what 

 the Ceylonese Buddhists assigned to the compound term, and what was 

 most consonant with the requirements of the passage in the Lalita 

 Vistara in which the word was first met with. It has since been met 

 with in other Sanskrit Buddhist works. It may be that I am totally 

 wrong, and my arguments are of no value ; but in the face of my re- 

 marks a simple denial without a single reason appears to me inconso- 

 nant with the practice usually followed in the republic of letters — not 

 to say uncourteous. It comes to me and to the public generally as an 

 ex cathedra, assertion. It reminds me of the advice which a learned 

 judge is said to have given to his son — ' pass your sentence, but give no 

 reason.' Under these circumstances I am not now in a position to say 

 anything about it. 



I find myself in a better situation as regards the constructive part 

 of Mr. Growse's letter. Writing to Professor Max Miiller Mr. Growse 

 says, ' I entirely agree with your view that it is a contraction of eka- 

 koti ; though when you are content to characterize it as an irregularity 

 I am bold enough to maintain that it is quite in accordance with rule. 

 The elision of the syllable lea in eka would no doubt be an anomaly, 

 though the analogies you adduce might sufficiently defend it on the 

 score of euphony. I think, hoAvever, that it is not the ha in eka that is 

 elided, but the k in koti, by Vararuchi's well-known rule that k (as in 

 suar for silkara), g and other consonants, when simple and non-initial, 

 are generally elided, the first letter of the latter member of a compound 

 being regarded as non-initial.' 



There is an omission in these remarks — quite an accidental one, I 

 presume — which is calculated to mislead the great bulk of English 

 readers for whom the ' Academy ' is published. In a discussion on the 

 derivation of a Sanskrit word most people would naturally think that 

 the rule cited by Mr. Growse with the predicate ' well-known ' was a 

 rule of Sanskrit orthography ; but in the present instance such an in- 

 ference, however legitimate, would be a mistaken one. Vararuchi is 

 not the author of any known Sanskrit Grammar, and the rule cited oc- 

 curs in his Grammar of the Prakrit language. Had Mr. Growse put 

 in the word ' Prakrit ' before ' rule ' the case would have been clear 

 enough. Supplying the omission, the first question that suggests 

 itself to me is — Arc the rules of Prakrit orthography applicable to Sans- 



