nauseous details, into their distribution of unhallowed things, to which the double meaning of "anathema" applies, the servants of a Christian Government are constrained to enter. Strange names and strange offices thus became familiar. There is a body of Granthis, or readers of the sacred volume, corresponding with the prebends of a Cathedral, except that the principle of hereditary succession has rendered much knowledge of the contents of the volume unnecessary. Beneath them come a most disreputable body of acolytes, or minor canons, who ought to perform the service of the Temple as the ministering Levites, but who have adopted secular habits, become moneylenders, extortioners, and give to the title of Pújári anything but the odour of sanctity. Beneath them come the choir, or singing men, known as Rágis, who sing hymns and chant the text of the sacred volumes in a manner unintelligible to the understanding, and unpleasing to the hearing. These are all Sikhs, and may at least have the credit of believing what they practise; but there is a fourth body, who are composed entirely of Mahometans, and who still are not ashamed to lend their vocal powers to the service of the heathen. These compose the orchestra, and extract inharmonious sounds by sweeping the strings of fat-bellied barbitons, called Rabábs, whence they are called Rabábis. These men claim to themselves the honour of being descended from that Mardhána, who accompanied Nának in his travels. Like their ancestor, they are a hungry lot.

Such is the great temple of the Sikhs, protected and endowed by the paternal Government, the centre of the hopes and aspirations of a great people, and which may some day prove the rallying point of our enemies. Leave it to itself and withdraw from it the patronage of the State, resume the lands set aside for the support of the brotherhood of Granthis, Pújáris, Rágis, and Rabábis, and the splendour of the institution will pass away. The gilded dome will lose its lustre, the marble walls will fall out of repair, the great Temple, with its assigned revenues and its stately establishments, will no longer be a snare for the vulgar, who are ever deceived by outward show. To act thus would be to act impartially, and in accordance with the true principles of non-interference. No necessities of State policy appear to justify the contrary policy, nor do those necessities exist.

AMRITSAR, 1859.

poraneous with the heroes whom he describes, and he resided on the banks of the river Jamná, near its confluence with the Ganges at Allahabad. Of this fact his accuracy of geographical description of the countries betwixt Oudh on one side and the Vindhya range on the other, leaves no doubt. Faithful tradition has marked the spot. In the district of Banda, in British Bundelkhand, about twenty miles from the right bank of the river Jamná, where these lines are written, stands the hill of Valmiki, near the village of Bágréhi; on the height is a fort, said to have been his residence. It has been the fortunate lot of the writer to visit more than one of the seven cities which claim the honour of the birth of the blind Mæonian. He has looked on Troy and at the heights of Ida, with feelings of reverence; and some such feelings have been engendered when he stood on the solitary hill of Valmiki, and drank in with eager gaze the wide view, which the poet must have contemplated, when he was dictating these sounding lines; a view which comprehends a portion of the country mentioned in the poem.

It is sad to say that the poet began his life as a notorious highway robber; but, repenting of his misdeeds, he betook himself to austerities on the hill, and eventually, when the spirit moved him, to versifying. This is his only work, that has come down to us, and an additional interest is attached to it from the fact that the poet received in his hermitage Sita, the faithful wife of the hero, when banished by her over-sensitive and jealous lord. There were born her two sons, Kúsa and Lava, who were taught, as children, to repeat and chant the lines descriptive of the great actions of their unknown father, by which they were eventually made known, received, and acknowledged; and from them the proudest Rájpúts trace their lineage. We have thus the poet blended with the hero of the piece, and the best proof that Valmíki was well acquainted with the history of Rama.

era.

Some critics place the date of these events long subsequent to the Christian era. The Hindus, on the contrary, erect a chronological edifice of their own, of which thousands of years form a unit, and place the date of these transactions in the second age, consequently many hundred thousand years before the Christian The more moderate take a middle course, and by a careful comparison of the probable with the improbable, and a collation of facts, give to the Ramayana a date, which must be anterior to the well-established date of Buddha, to whose existence no allusion is made. No doubt many passages, including all that attribute divinity to Rama, are the interpolations of a much later date, long subsequent to Buddha. Whether the poem was, for many ages, handed down by oral tradition by a race of bards, as Valmíki

This

have passed into a term for rhapsodists, or whether these stately lines were pricked by the author on the leaves of the palm in that early form of Indian character of which we have specimens dating back to the time of Asóka; such questions as these we abandon to the curious. It is sufficient for us that the epic has descended to our times perfect, inasmuch as no portion of it has been lost. The only difficulty is to get rid of the redundancies which have been added to it. The poem consists of seven cantos, and the number of slokes or double verses amounts to twenty-four thousand, which is faithfully recorded. But the last canto is generally rejected as spurious, and it is clearly beyond the scope of the epic, for it describes events which happened after the return of Rama to his country, his exile being completed and his labours done. canto may well be compared with the poems called vooros, which were tacked on to the great epic of the Greeks. Another difficulty has puzzled editors and critics, that of this huge poem there are two distinct recensions, in both of which the same story is told with precisely the same details, nearly the same number of couplets and chapters, often corresponding word for word and line for line, but as often differing, the same sentiment being clothed in different expressions; and so rich is the Sanskrit language, that it could produce a third version to tell the same story without repeating a single word, if required. These two recensions are known as the Bangáli and North-country versions; and by a singular accident both the distinguished German scholars, Schlegel and Lassen, have adopted the latter, while the Italian editor has in these volumes presented us with the former, each party speaking highly in favour of his own choice. If the disciples of Schlegel, as promised by him in his preface, finish the work commenced by their late master, we shall have the singular literary phenomenon of two editions of the text, differing so very much as to be clearly distinct works, while the translations still closely resemble each other.

As may be supposed, Indian commentators have found both the editions an ample field for their voluminous discussions; but their remarks apply chiefly to the meaning of the expressions, and, until European editors approached the subject, no criticism had been applied to the text. How much more fortunate have been the Homeric poems! Soon after their composition, they were collected under the orders of Pisistratus; how highly they were valued, long before our era, is shown by the fact of Alexander of Macedon always carrying a copy of the Iliad with him in his campaigns: and from the days of the Alexandrian schools until now the text, has been submitted to the most rigid criticism, and placed beyond doubt. Not so the great epic of the Hindus. Both editors allow that they have used much discretion in omitting what appeared to be repetitions,

CHAPTER III.

THE RAMAYANA: A SANSKRIT EPIC.

GORRESIO has done a service of no ordinary nature to all admirers of Sanskrit literature, and his labours deserve honourable mention in India. There is very little taste nowadays for the Sanskrit language, yet it would be a shame indeed to pass over noble volumes, published by an Italian at the national press of France, without some notice. This is no dull volume of exploded and abortive philosophy, no vast commentary, which it makes the head ache only to open and glance at, but a noble epic poem, fresh and original, second only to the great epic of the Greek nation; and the editor has done his duty well. He has published volumes of text, which in beauty and elegance of execution cannot be surpassed, and volumes of translation, into the Italian language. The critical notes are brief, but the prefaces contain much interesting information and a succinct but complete sketch of the history of the poem.

It is singular that we should have had to wait so long for a complete edition of the text, and translation into a European language, of this great masterpiece; still more strange, that we should be indebted at last to an Italian, a country in no way, either in times past or present, connected with India. In the years 1806 and 1810, Carey and Marshman published the text and English translation of two books and a half out of the seven, which complete the story; and not only are these volumes very scarce, but they are very inferior as productions of literary art, though no blame attaches to the excellent men, who, in the very dawn of Oriental studies, published in part what none of their successors have found ability or spirit to complete. Schlegel, twenty years afterwards, gave to the world the text of two books, with a Latin translation of the first, both unexceptionable in merit and excel- · lent as far as they go; but his labours were interrupted and never resumed; and another twenty years passed away ere Gorresio presented to the public, at the expense of Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, the text, the printing of which cannot be surpassed in any country, and the translation, in Italian, which may be equalled,