1858.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 371 



temple of the Goddess to whose worship he was devoted. These 

 no doubt had some peculiar charms, and I was still more delighted 

 when I observed that almost all the bricks of the temple bore 

 inscriptions which I at first could not read. I therefore looked for 

 an entire brick, and at last found the one I now submit for your 

 consideration. 



My main object in thus intruding upon your time is to have the 

 inscription deciphered. 



I must inform you that I tried if possible to decipher it. I think 

 I have partially made out some thing, but am very diffident as to 

 whether my conjectures are correct. 



The characters at first appear much like Deva Nagor, but I think 

 they are old Bengali. 



What I have been able to make out is this : — 



The temple seems from this to have been built by the Bajah of 

 Chhatna. 



I have much doubt about if 



If these are old Bengali characters, I would be happy to have the 

 other letters of the alphabet, in order that the great change which 

 those characters have undergone during the last three hundred 

 years, may be noticed. 



I have, &c, 

 (Sd.) Hoei Shtjnker Dutt. 



Baboo Gourdoss Bysack stated that the characters of the inscrip- 

 tion were Bengalee of the period of Chaitanya Deva, and very like 

 those of Lassen's fac simile edition of the Yajnadattabadha. 



They differ from the modern Bengali in the letter <T being written 

 like ^ without the dot at the bottom, and the latter being represent- 

 ed with a dot in the centre. This practice still obtains in Coch 

 Behar and is not unknown in Rungpur. The letter ij) is very pecu- 

 liarly formed and its duplication is indicated by the addition of the 

 figure 2, and not as usual at present by the repetition of the letter 

 itself. This mode of duplicating the Sri was not, however, uncom- 

 mon at the time when the brick was inscribed. In some of the 

 Nepalese coins of the 16th and 17th centuries figured by Mars- 

 den in his Numismata Orientalia, it occurs very frequently, and in a 



