1887.] S. C. Via— Exhibits d PMng. 249 



of the avaddnas, as given in the copy of the work brought from Tibet 

 by Babu Sarat Chandra Das. The single exception is, that the Babu's 

 Tibetan MS. substitutes an avaddna, called GarbhaJcrdnti, for the avaddna 

 of the metrical list which is called Shaddanta. 



Since therefore among 50 avaddnas there is only a difference of one 

 name, the identity of the Tibetan manuscript with the lost work may 

 be said to be complete. To Babu Sarat Chandra Das, is due the credit 

 of recovering an ancient and valuable work which was given up for 

 lost in India for about six hundred years. 



In editing the second volume of the work Babu Sarat Chandra 

 will have the benefit, besides the block-print and the Tibetan transla- 

 tion, which he has brought from Lhasa, of the three manuscripts in the 

 Libraries of Cambridge and Calcutta. But in editing the first volume 

 he will have to depend entirely on the excellent and very carefully 

 executed block-print and the Tibetan translation. I shall of course be 

 always ready to render him any assistance that lies in my power in 

 editing the Sanskrit portion of this valuable work, which may be con- 

 sidered as a store-house of Buddhist legends of the Mahayana school, 

 as the Mahavastu is a store-house of those of the Mahasanghikas. The 

 work is written in easy flowing verse and in simple poetic and idiomatic 

 Sanscrit. It is entirely free from that verbosity and tediousness of 

 narration which characterises Buddhist Sanskrit works in general, a cir- 

 cumstance which may be accounted for by the fact that, as tradition 

 informs us, the Kalpalata was composed by a Brahmanic Sanskrit 

 scholar, at the request of his Bnddhist friends. Babu Sarat Chandra's 

 edition of Kalpalata will not only be a valuable contribution to the 

 Buddhist Sanskrit Literature, but will be a great help to scholars de- 

 sirous of studying the Tibetan language, because they will be able to 

 learn it through the medium of Sanskrit. 



The work will be published with the Sanskrit and Tibetan texts in 

 juxta-position. 



The following extract from a letter from Professor Max Muller to 

 Babu Sarat Chandra Das on the subject of Ehotibluiva was read — 



It seems to me that your interpretation is right — at all events, it is 

 the best I know. I have taken the liberty to make a few alterations in 

 your quotations from Panini's grammar, so as to enable English readers 

 to understand better what you mean. I have always had great faith in 

 Tibetan translations, and I expect much from that quarter for an eluci- 

 dation of Buddhist difficulties. 



Babu Sarat Chandra Das exhibited a curious reed organ, called 

 Pheng, the favourite musical instrument of the Siamese and the people 



