1G7 
1873.] 
John Beanies —Grammar of Chanel JBardal. 
recognize the thoroughly transitional character of the language we have 
to deal with. 
The second obstruction to he removed is that of texts j so far as I have 
seen, the MSS. at present available, some five in all, have all been copied 
from the same original text, and servilely repeat the old mistakes. Where 
they differ from one another, we can generally detect merely an additional 
error of the copyist. It is not necessary therefore to enter upon a detailed 
collation of texts, such a process would not lead to our finding out or 
establishing one settled and correct reading. Sometimes for thousands of 
lines together, there is not the divergence of a single letter between the 
whole five MSS., the same obvious errors being faithfully repeated by all. 
Historically the Baidla MS. has the best right to he considered the 
representative of the original text. Tod’s and Caulfields’ MSS. belonging 
to the Royal Asiatic Society, were made for the officers whose names they 
bear in the second decade of the present century, as stated in the colophon 
to each, though it is not stated from what older MS. they were copied. The 
Bodleian has no colophon, hut agrees, as far as I was able to compare it, 
with Tod’s. The Agra which is the worst, and most carelessly written of 
all, is also from the same origin, with a great many extra blunders of its 
own. I do not know from what source the translations lately printed in 
the ‘ Indian Antiquary’ are derived, but from the absence of proper arrange¬ 
ment and the scanty nature of many of the extracts, it is probable that the 
MS. was not a perfect one. As to the many imperfect scraps which may be 
found here and there in the libraries of native princes, they are so 
fragmentary and so interspersed with matter which Chand never wrote, and 
their language has often been so obviously modernized, that it will be wiser 
to disregard them altogether, classing them under the head of “ pseudo- 
Chan d fragments,” and sticking to the few complete copies which are 
accessible. For working purposes, Dr. Hoernle and myself are taking Tod’s 
as our basis, occasionally assisted by the Baidla and Agra. Caulfield’s and 
the Bodleian being locked up in English libraries cannot be used. 
Taking then the work as it stands, and not-troubling ourselves in our 
present initiatory stage with either spelling or text, the following notes may 
be found useful to start with, though many of them may have to he modified 
as we learn more about our subject. For it must be steadily borne in mind 
that we are only at the beginning of the battle, and have no predecessors in 
the field, of whose labours we can avail ourselves. Everything hereinafter 
stated, is therefore tentative, and, pro hac vice only, dogmatizing would be 
premature. Moreover, Chand is the earliest poet in the language, and we 
can therefore illustrate him only hy his successors ; his relations to those who 
went before him are absolutely indeterminable for the present, and will 
probably long remain obscure. 
