A CHRESTOMATHY 
OF 
THE MAITHILI LANGUAGE. 
This reading book contains nearly all the Maithili Literature I have 
been able to collect. I hope that every word in it will be found in the 
Vocabulary; special precautions having been taken to secure this object. 
The prose will be found much the purest, being practically written 
according to the rules laid down in the grammar. The poetry is not so 
pure, poetic license admitting many Hindi and Braj forms and words. 
These will be found noted in the Vocabulary. Of the poets, the worst sinner 
in this respect is Fatiiri Lai, in the song of the Famine. Bidyapati or 
Vidyapati, as he is indifferently called, is comparatively pure, but, as might 
be expected, archaic forms and words appear in his poems, and he is fre¬ 
quently obscure ar 1 almost always difficult. Often he exhibits a neatness 
of expression and conciseness worthy of Martial. I hence put him near 
the end of the reading book, though his songs are the first which I collected 
and reduced to order. 
The first piece given, is a letter copied verbatim et literatim from a 
letter filed in my court ; only names of persons and places have, for obvious 
reasons, been changed, and a few signs of punctuation added. 
11 WT m I! 
^rf% fErc'sftfa wicft %” ^tjtt stint ut 
ITfT fWl Wv3T, W W I ^l«t Yfl 
its lf^, uY irm: tresrcst fnes % inxw 
WcfT i m mt 
^tl, % SERTtl il<J, ITfT Xmi; IT ij ST 
%R, TTOmT TW 11; % S10 9lf?T ^5 ST ^«T ill ^CTTUT R 
A. 
