kva nûnám su-dânavah mádatha vrikta-barhishah. Where do ye rejoice now, you gods for whom the altar is trimmed?

Otherwise, vrikta-barhishah might, with a change of accent, supply an accusative to dadhidhve: Will you take the worshippers in your arms?' This, however, is not necessary, as to take by the hand may be used as a neuter verb.

Benfey: Wo weilt ihr gern? was habt ihr jetzt

gleichwie ein Vater seinen Sohn-in Händen, da das Opfer harrt?'

Wilson: Maruts, who are fond of praise, and for whom the sacred grass is trimmed, when will you take us by both hands as a father does his son?'

Verse 2, note. The idea of the first verse, that the Maruts should not be detained by other pursuits, is carried on in the second. The poet asks, what they have to do in the sky, instead of coming down to the earth. The last sentence seems to mean 'where tarry your herds?' viz. the clouds. Sâyana translates: Where do worshippers, like lowing cows, praise you?" Wilson: Where do they who worship you cry to you like cattle.' Benfey: 'Wo jauchzt man euch, gleich wie Stiere? (Ihre Verehrer brüllen vor Freude über ihre Gegenwart, wie Stiere.)' The verb ranyati, however, when followed by an accusative, means to love, to accept with pleasure. The gods accept the offerings and the prayers:

v. 18, 1. vísvâni yáh ámartyah havya márteshu rányati. The immortal who deigns to accept all offerings among mortals.

v. 74, 3. kásya bráhmâni ranyathah.

Whose prayers do ye accept?

Followed by a locative ranyati means to delight in. Both the gods are said to delight in prayers (viii. 12, 18; 33, 16), and prayers are said to delight in the gods (viii. 16, 2). I therefore take ranyanti in the sense of tarrying, disporting, and ná, if it is to be retained, in the sense of not; where do they not sport? meaning that they are to be found everywhere, except where the poet desires them to be. We thus get rid of the simile of singing poets and lowing cows, which,

though not too bold for Vedic bards, would here come in too abruptly. It would be much better, however, if the negative particle could be omitted altogether. If we retain it, we must read: kvã váh | gâváh | na rán | yantí | But the fact is that through the whole of the Rig-veda kva has always to be pronounced as two syllables, kuva. There is only one passage, v. 61, 2, where, before a vowel, we have to read kva: kuva vo 'svâh, kvâbhîsavah. In other passages, even before vowels, we always have to read kuva, e. g. i. 161, 4. kuvet kva it; i. 105, 4. kuvartam = kva ritam. In i. 35, 7, we must read either kuvedânîm sûryah, making sûryah trisyllabic, or kuva idânîm, leaving a hiatus. In i. 168, 6, kvâvaram is kuvâvaram: Sâkalya, forgetting this, and wishing to improve the metre, added na, thereby, in reality, destroying both the metre and the sense. Kva occurs as dissyllabic in the Rig-veda at least forty-one times.

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Verse 3, note 1. The meanings of sumná in the first five Mandalas are well explained by Professor Aufrecht in Kuhn's Zeitschrift, vol. iv. p. 274. As to suvita in the plural, see x. 86, 21, and viii. 93, 29, where Indra is said to bring all suvita's. It frequently occurs in the singular:

x. 148, I. ã nah bhara suvitám yásya kâkán.

Verse 4, note. One might translate: If you, sons of Prisni, were mortals, the immortal would be your worshipper.' But this seems almost too deep and elaborate a compliment for a primitive age. Langlois translates: 'Quand vous ne seriez pas immortels, (faites toutefois) que votre panégyriste jouisse d'une longue vie.' Wilson's translation is obscure: That you, sons of Priśni, may become mortals, and your panegyrist become immortal.' Sâyana translates: Though you, sons of Prisni, were mortal, yet your worshipper would be immortal.' I think it best to connect the fourth and fifth verses, and I feel justified in so doing by other passages where the same or a similar idea is expressed, viz. that if the god were the poet and the poet the god, then the poet would be more liberal to the god than the god is to him. Thus I translated a passage,

vii. 32, 18, in my History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 545: If I were lord of as much as thou, I should support the sacred bard, thou scatterer of wealth, I should not abandon him to misery. I should award wealth day by day to him who magnifies, I should award it to whosoever it be.' Another parallel passage is pointed out by Mr. J. Muir. (On the Interpretation of the Veda, p. 79.) viii. 19, 25: 'If, Agni, thou wert a mortal, and I were an immortal, I should not abandon thee to malediction or to wretchedness; my worshipper should not be miserable or distressed.' Still more to the point is another passage, viii. 44, 23: 'If I were thou, and thou wert I, then thy wishes should be fulfilled.' See also viii. 14, 1, 2.

As to the metre it is clear that we ought to read

Verse 5, note1. Ma, though it seems to stand for ná, retains its prohibitive sense.

Verse 5, note 2. Yávasa is explained by Sâyana as grass, and Wilson's Dictionary, too, gives to it the meaning of meadow or pasture grass, whereas yava is barley. The Greek ea or eá is likewise explained as barley or rye, fodder for horses. See i. 91, 13. gấvah ná yávaseshu, like cows in meadows.

Verse 5, note 3. The path of Yama can only be the path. that leads to Yama, as the ruler of the departed.

x. 14, 8. sám gakkhasva pitrí-bhih sám yaména. Meet with the fathers, meet with Yama, (x. 14, 10; 15, 8.) X. 14, 7. yamám pasyâsi várunam ka devám. Thou wilt see (there) Yama and the divine Varuna. x. 165, 4. tásmai yamaya námah astu mrityáve. Adoration to that Yama, to Death!

Wilson: 'Never may your worshipper be indifferent to you, as a deer (is never indifferent) to pasture, so that he may not tread the path of Yama.' Benfey: Wer euch besingt, der sei euch nicht gleichgültig, wie das Wild im Gras, nicht wandl' er auf des Yama Pfad.' Kgoshya is translated insatiable by Professor Goldstücker.

Verse 6, note 1. One of the meanings of nírriti is sin. It is derived from the same root which yielded ritá, in the sense of right. Nírriti was conceived, it would seem, as going away from the path of right, the German Vergehen. Nírriti was personified as a power of evil and destruction.

vii. Io4, 9. áhaye và tấn pra-dádâtu sómah ẩ và dadhatu níh-riteh upá-sthe.

May Soma hand them over to Ahi, or place them in the lap of Nirriti.

i. 117, 5. susupvamsam ná níh-riteh upá-sthe.

Like one who sleeps in the lap of Nirviti.

Here Sâyana explains Nirriti as earth, and he attaches the same meaning to the word in other places which will have to be considered hereafter. Cf. Lectures on the Science of Language, Second Series, pp. 515, 516.

Wilson treats Nirriti as a male deity, and translates the last words, 'let him perish with our evil desires.'

Verse 6, note 2. Padîshtá is formed as an optative of the Âtmanepada, but with the additional s before the t, which, in the ordinary Sanskrit, is restricted to the so-called benedictive (Grammar, § 385; Bopp, Kritische Grammatik, ed. 1834, § 329, note). Pad means originally to go, but in certain constructions it gradually assumed the meaning of to perish, and native commentators are inclined to explain it by pat, to fall. One can watch the transition of meaning from going into perishing in such phrases as V. S. xi. 46. mâ pâdy âyushah purâ, literally, 'may he not go before the time,' but really intended for 'may he not die before the time.' In the Rig-veda padîshtá is generally qualified by some words to show that it is to be taken in malam partem. Thus in our passage, and in iii. 53, 21; vii. 104, 16; 17. In i. 79, 11, however, padîshtá sáh is by itself used in a maledictory sense, pereat, may he perish! In another, vi. 20, 5, pẩdi by itself conveys the idea of perishing. This may have some weight in determining the origin of the Latin pestis (Corssen, Kritische Beiträge, p. 396), for it shows that, even without prepositions, such as á or vi, pad may have an ill-omened meaning. In the Aitareya-brâhmana vii. 14 (History of

Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 471), pad, as applied to a child's teeth, means to go, to fall out. With sam, however, pad has always a good meaning, and this shows that originally its meaning was neutral.

Verse 7, note1. The only difficult word is avâtẩm. Sâyana explains it, without wind.' But it is hardly possible to understand how the Maruts, themselves the gods of the storm, the sons of Rudra, could be said to bring clouds without wind. Langlois, it is true, translates without any misgivings Ces dieux peuvent sur un sol desséché faire tomber la pluie sans l'accompagner de vent.' Wilson: 'They send down rain without wind upon the desert.' Benfey saw the incongruous character of the epithet, and explained it away by saying that the winds bring rain, and after they have brought it, they moderate their violence in order not to drive it away again; hence rain without wind. Yet even this explanation, though ingenious, and, as I am told, particularly truthful in an Eastern climate, is somewhat too artificial. If we changed the accent, ávâtâm, unchecked, unconquered, would be better than avâtẩm, windless. But ávâta, unconquered, does not occur in the Rig-veda, except as applied to persons. It occurs most frequently in the phrase vanván ávâtah, which Sâyana explains well by himsan ahimsitah, hurting, but not hurt: (vi. 16, 20; 18, 1; ix. 89, 7.) In ix. 96, 8, we read prit-sú vanván ávâtah, in battles attacking, but not attacked, which renders the meaning of ávâta perfectly clear. In vi. 64, 5, where it is applied to Ushas, it may be translated by unconquerable, intact.

There are several passages, however, where avâta occurs with the accent on the last syllable, and where it is accordingly explained as a Bahuvrîhi, meaning either windless or motionless, from vâta, wind, or from vâta, going, (i. 62, 10.) In some of these passages we can hardly doubt that the accent ought to be changed, and that we ought to read ávâta. Thus in vi. 64, 4, avâte is clearly a vocative applied to Ushas, who is called ávâtâ, unconquerable, in the verse immediately following. In i. 52, 4, the Maruts are called avâtâh, which can only be ávâtâh, unconquerable; nor can we hesitate in viii. 79, 7, to change avâtáh into ávâtah, as an