1833.] A Legend of Himdlaya—by Cdliddsa. 331 
1. 
* In regions far North, clad in deiform might, 
The Mountain King rises, HrmAtaya hight : 
* Whose giant form, stretching along in one sweep 
* From th’ Eastern main forth to the Westernmost deep, 
Might seem, as it join’d them, the measuring rod 
* Laid o’er the broad earth by its architect God. 
Vite integer qui, scelerisque purus, 
Non idle Mauri jaculis neque arcu, 
Nec felle tinctis gravida sagittis, 
Mi Fusce, securus eget pharetra. 
Though this particular species of double dochmiac measure does not itself occur 
in Horace or in Pindar, it may be found sometimes inthe choral strains of the Greek 
tragic poets—but in insulated lines only. Thus in the Perse of Aschylus, the 5th 
strophe and antistrophe of the last choral song of lamentation contain the following 
regular Indra-vajra lines. 
Stroph. TiS otk; dAwrAe peyddAws Ta Mepoay [v. 999.] 
Antistr. Tpawévta vavpparrtov éepéis duro [v. 1009.) 
(each being followed by two lines in the kindred Indian measure called aww fax) 
The following commencement of a similar strain in the Antigone of Sophocles, 
(uttered by the unfortunate heroine herself,) is in the same measure : 
Stroph. Opiate ww yas marpias modira [v. 817.] 
Antistr. “Hxovoa 5) Avypotdtay dAécba [v. 834.] 
(in which we may also observe, no less than in the Alcaic, another peculiarity of our 
Indian measure, the commonness of the first syllable). 
So is the commencement of a similar strain in vv. 431 and 439 of the Medea of 
Euripides, (p. 39, ed. Porson)—and the concluding line of another in vv. 763,771 of 
the Supplices of Aischylus, (p. 35,36, ed. Scholfield)—and others which it were 
needless to transcribe. 
Sz. 1. the measuring rod 
Laid o’er the broad earth by its architect God. 
The words ‘‘ by its architect God’’ are an addition to the expressions of the ori- 
ginal, but not to the sense, even according to Hindu ideas: the earth’s “‘ measuring 
rod’ presupposing a builder, viz. the creator Brahma. When we consider the 
Himélaya, in the words of the Baron de St. Croix, as a part of one “‘ great chain of 
mountains which rising on the sides of Lycia, Pamphylia, and Cilicia, stretch across 
Asia from West to East, and after receiving the different names of Taurus, Paropa- 
misus, Imaus, and Emodus, terminate at the sea that washes China,”’ and thus join, 
as our poet declares, both oceans,—the comparison of the vast progressive range to 
such a rod, will scarcely be thought an unhappy one. But bating this, which is pecu- 
liar to our Indian author,—the image of an artificer, and even of an instrument of 
measurement, is not thought unworthy to represent the Supreme Being, and his 
absolute control of the most stupendous objects of the visible creation, in the pure 
theology of our inspired Scriptures. See Isaiah xi, 12, 15, &c. but I would parti- 
cularly refer to two remarkable instances in the book of Job (xxviii, 25, and xxxviii. 
3, 4) : inthe former of which the Hebreo-Arabic word 710 (%av0) applied to the 
uo o2 
