101 
1891.] Karl Marx —Documents relating to the history of Ladakh. 
incomplete. It is much inferior to either A or B. It is obvious in 
several places that alterations were introduced on purpose, and the 
principle underlying this practice can easily be discovered: it is, to 
avoid, in the first place, the miraculous, secondly, anything that may 
be offensive to the Dogra reader, and thirdly, all that may throw an 
unfavourable light on the Royal family. Still, there are a few passages 
preserved in it that are new; and they will be found introduced in 
their proper places and specially marked in A and B. This MS. covers 
the entire history of the kings of Tibet (Yar-lung) and of Ladakh to close 
upon the Dogra invasion. It also contains an interlinear translation 
into Urdu, but written in Tibetan (U-med) characters. 
The second part of O-MS., was prepared for me at my special 
request by the writer of the first part, who is the head of one of the 
ancient families that presided over important functions under the old 
regime. As I am not an official personage, I think, I need not appre¬ 
hend that he withheld the truth from me. In this portion he almost 
exclusively relates the events of the Dogra wars and the fall of the 
Ladakh empire. As his own father was mixed up to some extent with 
these painful affairs, it is to him a kind of family history as well. The 
very fact that he tells it at all and without any embellishing touches, 
goes far to prove his veracity in this case; and as the whole narrative 
does not contain one word derogatory to the conquerors, but a long 
tale of ignominy and shame to the losing, i. e., his own, side, I 
think the character of the writer is fully established thereby. I, there¬ 
fore, purpose giving this part of the MS. separately under the title 
of C-MS. It consists of about 6 folio leaves. Its language is the 
modern Ladakh book-language, and this fact alone should render it 
particularly interesting to students of the Tibetan language. 
It will appear from these remarks, that all the three manuscripts 
were arranged by me so as to form one consecutive whole, containing 
as full an account of the history of Ladakh, as, for the present, it is 
possible to give. 
As none of these documents, however, from a literary point of 
view, is really of classical value, I did not hesitate to introduce such 
corrections in the spelling of words, as were necessary to render them 
as readable as possible. The spelling uniformly adopted is that of 
Jaschke’s Dictionary. Only in C-MS. I shall preserve the original 
orthography, wherever it is accounted for by Ladakh usage. 
As to my own translation it is superfluous te say, that I attempted 
to give as true and faithful a rendering of the original in English as I 
could; and I hope and trust, that mistakes are few and far between. 
On the other hand, 1 may say, that it has been my aim throughout to 
