30 
Hugh Fraser —Folklore from Eastern Gorakpur. 
[No. 1, 
No. IX. 
V. 1. *3* means ‘ who is this’. is merely a strengthened 
form of y, ‘ this’. 
qyr?;, does not equal f^UTT?;. It is the verbal noun (conj. participle) 
of q^T, ‘run away’, (cf. 13 an gall The q^T is common in 
Bihari: thus, in the Maithili Haribans of Manhodh (10, 38), rffsT 
•r^qfrT qrjTj; ‘ deserting the field of battle the king ran away’. 
Y. 2. ^q«fT is oblique of * own’. The latter half of this 
verse, and of v. 4 has four instants too many. 
Y. 4. fqqqr is an optional form of qq^T, the long form of qiY, ‘a 
tiger’. I have never met the word in the sense of ‘ hysena’. 
No. X. 
g and ^ in the 2nd and 4th verses appears to be superfluous. 
No XI. 
The metre of this incantation is most irregular. It affords no assist¬ 
ance towards judging the correctness or otherwise of the spelling. 
As usual in these doggrel incantations, in which the charmer assumes 
an air of superior education, it is full of Hindi forms. Examples are q 
‘ they are’, in the 1st verse, and the typical long % of the 2nd verse. In 
the Bihar dialects the sign of the direct (and not the oblique genitive) 
is always short. 
V. 1. qy, one would have expected qy, the locative here. 
V. 5. This is Hindi. qTy is almost certainly incorrect for qrc or 
qTq, and the whole means ‘ I reverence the feet of the good (or possibly 
seven) teacher (or teachers). 
Y. 7. for is a regular Bihari 3 sing. fern, past of 
y (or ^ »5t), ‘bathe’. 
JT^ii is instr. sing, of Jiygr = JPJ^T. 
V. 8. qf^YT is the Hindi past tense of qfqgqT, ‘ to put on’. 
fqqryq = Hindi fqq\gr<TT- for qgrfy, is conj. participle of 
TT^rr^r, ‘ stretch out’, the causal of f qgg, ‘ be scattered’. 
Judging from the language of the above song, the charmer was pro¬ 
bably a Muhammadan. 
No. XII. 
V. 1. qg#q, 3 plur. past of qg, ‘ set’, qg is the regular Bihari 
root. qq is borrowed from Hindi, when used at all, as in the last song, 
is locative of qife, ‘ a bough’. 
V. 3. The metre of these two lines is beyond correction. ojfqgT 
is 1 sing. pret. conditional of qftq, ‘ knovv’. is 3 plur. future of ^r, 
