PREFACE. Vll 



Some modification of the existing scale of postage may however 

 confidently be expected, which may save contributors especial- 

 ly from the heavy tax on the transmission of manuscripts*. 



If it be asked, what has been the most prominent object of 

 interest discussed in the present volume, the answer must 

 naturally point to the Proceedings of the Asiatic Society, in 

 regard to the publication of the Oriental Works which had been 

 suspended by an order of the Supreme Government, dated the 

 7th March, 1835. 



Without venturing to impugn in any degree the wisdom or 

 policy of a measure which has in the face of all India with- 

 drawn the countenance of Government from the learned na- 

 tives of the country, and pronounced a verdict of condemna- 

 tion and abandonment on its literature, it may be allowable in 

 this place to prophecy, that the conduct of the Asiatic Society, 

 in stepping forward to rescue the half-printed volumes of Sanscrit, 

 Arabic, and Persian, will be approved and applauded by every 

 learned Society and every scholar in Europe. Left in their un- 

 finished state, they would have indeed merited the opprobrious 

 designation of an " accumulation of waste paper," applied to 

 them by the Government which had originally ordered, and had 

 expended vast sums upon, their publication. 



There seems something so anomalous in this sudden change 

 of state resolve, that it can be explained (excused would be 

 too presumptuous a term) only by the peculiar constitution 

 of the British Indian Government, in which the interests of a 

 literature, and of languages, necessarily foreign to the deputed 

 ruler of these distant provinces of the British Empire, must be 

 left to the fluctuating opinions and influence of his local ad- 

 visers. The unbiassed spectator beholds, at one period, the 

 Government accusing itself of doing nothing for Indian learning 

 and making amends by establishing colleges and patronizing pub- 

 lications and translations into the Oriental languages : anon, 

 he beholds it throwing up all the works half translated or half 

 printed ; and withdrawing all the scholarships and exhibitions, 

 which had been instituted for the encouragement and support of 

 poor native students ; — annulling most of the appointments which 



* In one case, Twenty-two Rupees on a brief article from Bombay. 



