BOOK III. constant use to this day all over Hindostan; and CHAP. IV. MEDICINE. THE earliest medical writers extant are Charaka and Susruta. We do not know the date of either of them; but there is a commentary on the second and later of the two, which was written in Cashmír in the twelfth or thirteenth century, and does not seem to have been the first.* These authors were translated into Arabic, and probably soon after that nation turned its attention to literature. The Arab writers openly acknowledge their obligations to the medical writers of India, and place their knowledge on a level with that of the Greeks. It helps to fix the date of their becoming known to the Arabs, to find that two Hindús, named Manka and Saleh, were physicians to Hárún al Rashíd in the eighth century.t Their acquaintance with medicines seems to have been very extensive. extensive. We are not surprised at their knowledge of simples, in which they gave early lessons to Europe, and more recently taught * Most of the information in this chapter is taken from an essay on the antiquity of the Indian materia medica, by Dr. Royle, Professor of King's College, London. The additions are from Ward's Hindoos (vol. ii. p. 337, &c.), and Mr. Coats, Transactions of the Literary Society of Bombay, vol. iii. p. 232. + Professor Dietz, quoted by Dr. Royle, p. 64. CHAP. BOOK III. us the benefit of smoking datura in asthma, and the use of cowitch against worms: their chymical skill is a fact more striking and more unexpected. They knew how to prepare sulphuric acid, nitric acid, and muriatic acid; the oxide of copper, iron, lead (of which they had both the red oxide and litharge), tin, and zinc; the sulphuret of iron, copper, mercury, antimony, and arsenic; the sulphate of copper, zinc, and iron; and carbonates of lead and iron. Their modes of preparing those substances seem, in some instances, if not in all, to have been peculiar to themselves.* Their use of these medicines seems to have been very bold. They were the first nation who employed minerals internally, and they not only gave mercury in that manner, but arsenic and arsenious acid, which were remedies in intermittents. They have long used cinnabar for fumigations, by which they produce a speedy and safe salivation. Their surgery is as remarkable as their medicine, especially when we recollect their ignorance of anatomy. They cut for the stone, couched for the cataract, and extracted the foetus from the womb, and in their early works enumerate no less than 127 sorts of surgical instruments. But their instruments were probably always rude. At present they are so much so, that, though very See Dr. Royle, p. 44., who particularly refers to the processes for making calomel and corrosive sublimate. Dr. Royle, p. 49. successful in cataract, their operations for the CHAP. stone are often fatal. They have long practised inoculation; but still many lives were lost from small-pox, until the introduction of vaccination. The Hindú physicians are attentive to the pulse and to the state of the skin, of the tongue, eyes, &c., and to the nature of the evacuations; and they are said to form correct prognostics from the observation of the symptoms. But their practice is all empirical, their theory only tending to mislead them. Nor are they always judicious in their treatment in fevers, for instance, they shut up the patient in a room artificially heated, and deprive him, not only of food, but drink. They call in astrology and magic to the aid of their medicine, applying their remedies at appropriate situations of the planets, and often accompanying them with mystical verses and charms. Many of these defects probably belonged to the art in its best days, but the science has no doubt declined; chemists can conduct their preparations successfully without having the least knowledge of the principles by which the desired changes are effected; physicians follow the practice of their instructors without inquiry; and surgery is so far neglected, that bleeding is left to the barber, bonesetting to the herdsman, and every man is ready to administer a blister, which is done with the juice of the euphorbium, and still oftener with the actual cautery. IV. CHAP. V. LANGUAGE. BOOK THE Shanscrit language has been pronounced by one whose extensive acquaintance with those of Shanscrit. other ancient and modern nations entitles his opinion to respect, to be " of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either."* The language so highly commended seems always to have received the attention it deserved. Panini, the earliest extant writer on its grammar, is so ancient as to be mixed up with the fabulous ages. His works and those of his successors have established a system of grammar the most complete that ever was employed in arranging the elements of human speech. I should not, if I were able, enter on its details in this place; but some explanation of them is accessible to the English reader in an essay of Mr. Colebrooke.t Sir W. Jones, Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 422. + Asiatic Researches, vol. vii. p. 199. Among many marks of high polish, is one which must have particularly promoted the melody of its versification. This consists in what Mr. Colebrooke calls its euphonical orthography, by which letters are changed, not only so as to avoid harsh combinations in particular |