John Beames— Grammar of Gliand Barddi. 
[No. 2, 
106 
Two explanations suggest themselves for this state of things. In the 
case of alterations which affect the metrical quantity of the syllable, we 
may suspect that they had been made metri causa , as is customary in Hindi 
poetry ; and in those which do not affect the quantity, we can often see 
various forms of the same word in successive stages of phonetic corruption. 
But those two explanations do not account for every change, nor is all 
yet explained, even if we add the ignorance or carelessness of copyists. 
Moreover, we are led*to be very shy about using the metri causa argument 
from observing the extreme laxity of the poet in this respect. Looking at 
his metres simply according to the name they bear, we may divide them into 
three classes : 
1st. Those identical with Sanskrit metres. 
2nd. Those peculiar to the poet. 
3rd. Those identical with modem metres. 
Leaving out the second as indeterminable at present, if we take the 
first and third we find that by no process can we make them scan. We 
may indulge to the full in the liberty of inserting or omitting the unwritten 
short a , we may pronounce diphthongs as one, two, or three syllables, 
but not even thus can some of the lines be brought to accord with the scale. 
Sometimes ten lines will scan quite accurately, and the eleventh be all 
wrong. The bards of the present day call Chand’s style the £ dingal bhdkha ,’ 
as contrasted with ^ ping at bhaJchd ,’ or verse constructed according to strict 
rules of prosody. It must be remembered that many of these poems were 
impromptu productions, and most, if not all, were written to be sung, and 
any deficiency of syllables could be covered by prolonging one sound over two 
or three notes, as often happens in English songs, or on the other hand two 
or more syllables could be sung to one note as in our chanting. Where so 
much license exists, we cannot use the metrical argument except with great 
caution. # 
We are, therefore, driven back to the conclusion that in Chand’s time 
the form of words and their pronunciation was extremely unfixed. This 
is probable from historical considerations also ; and the use of the conclusion 
itself to us in our present enquiry is that it removes out of the way the 
necessity of attempting to establish a fixed set of forms for words and 
inflexions. We take all Chand’s words for the present as they stand, we 
take each word in four or five different forms if need be, and do not trouble 
ourselves to find out which is the right form for Chand’s period, simply 
because we do not believe there was any right form, any one form, that is, 
more used and more generally accepted than any other. In fact, we 
* Since writing the above, I have been informed by Dr. Hoernle that he does not 
find Chand’s metres so irregular as the bards report, but the learned professor allows 
himself to alter the spelling of the text to bring the words into agreement with the 
metres, a practice which seems somewhat premature. 
