regarded as special authorities in each of these principal schools.

1. In Bengal both Manu and Yajnavalkya are of course held in great reverence as original sources of law. We have already noted that the best commentary on Manu is one called Manv-artha-muktāvalī, by Kullūkabhaṭṭa (see p. 221). There is also a commentary by Medhātithi (partially lost, and completed by another author); another by Govinda-raja; another by Dharanidhara, Bhāguri, and others. To Yajnavalkya belong at least four other commentaries besides the Mitāksharā, viz. that of Apararka (which is the oldest of all); of Śūla-pāņi (called the Dipa-kalikā); of Deva-bodha, and of Viśva-rūpa. Śūla-pāņi is also the author of a work on penance and expiation. The Mitāksharā of Vijñāneśvara1 is, however, the principal commentary on Yajnavalkya (as before noticed). It is much studied in Bengal, but the chief authority in the Bengal school is a well-known work, somewhat different in character and principles, called the Daya-bhāga or treatise on inheritance,' ascribed to Jimūta-vāhana, by some thought to have been a prince of the house of Silara, who either composed this work himself or caused it to be compiled rather earlier than the beginning of the sixteenth century. It should be stated that both the Mitākshara and Daya-bhāga are developments of, rather than commentaries on, Manu and Yajnavalkya. Although they profess to be based on these ancient books, they sometimes modify the laws there propounded to suit a more advanced social system. In other

1 Vijnanesvara belonged to a sect of Sannyasins founded by Sankaracārya, and his commentary may have been written as early as the ninth century of our era.

2 Translated by Colebrooke. Jimūta-vāhana's work seems to have been called Dharma-ratna, and only the chapter on inheritance is preserved.

cases they discuss doubtful points and supply omissions; while they, in their turn, have been commented on by succeeding lawyers, whose works introduce still further modifications on various important points, thus:

Three principal commentaries on the Mitakshara are named, viz. the Subodhini of Viśveśvara-bhaṭṭa (thought by Colebrooke to be as old as the fourteenth century); a later work by Balam-bhaṭṭa; and a third (called the Pratiītāksharā) by Nanda-pandita (who was also the author of the work on adoption called Dattaka-mīmānsā and of the Vaijayanti (see next page). The commentaries on the Dāya-bhāga are numerous. Some of these (published under the patronage of Prasanna Kumār Thākur) are, that of Srikrishna-tarkālan-kāra, which, with a treatise by the same author called Daya-krama-san-graha, is highly esteemed in Bengal; that of Srī-nāthācārya-ćūḍāmani; that of Aéyuta-ćakravartin; and that of Maheśvara. Before any of these ought to be placed the works of a celebrated Brahman (who lived at the beginning of the sixteenth century), named Raghu-nandana, in about twenty-seven books, on rites and customs and the times of their observance. His treatises, intended to comment on and support Jimūta-vāhana, are called Smriti-tattva, Tithi-tattva, &c., the former including the Vyavahara-tattva and Daya-tattva 2.

2. As regards the school of Benares and Middle India it should be noted that the Mitaksharā of Vijñāneśvara is acknowledged as an authority, and studied by the adherents of this school, as it is to a certain extent by all five schools. But in the Benares school certain popular commentaries on the Mitaksharā, such as the Vira-mitrodaya of Mitra-miśra and the Vivāda-tāṇḍava of Kamalākara, have great weight.

3. In the Maithila school or that of Mithila (North Behar and Tirhut), besides the Code of Yajnavalkya with the

1 The certainty we feel as to the accuracy of the texts of all important Sanskrit works is due to the practice of writing commentaries, which always quote the words of the original, and so prevent changes. Again, the accuracy and genuineness of the best commentaries is secured by

other commentaries on them.

2 Printed at Calcutta in 1828. Raghu-nandana is often called Smartabhaṭṭācārya.

Mitakshara, the Vivāda-cintāmaṇi and Vyavahara-ćintāmaṇi of Vaćaspati Miśra1 are much studied; also the Vivādaratnākara of Caṇḍeśvara (who lived about 1314) and the Vivāda-ćandra, composed by a learned female named Lakhima-devi, who is said to have set the name of her kinsman, Misaru-miśra, to her own works.

4. In the Dravidian or South-Indian school, besides the Mitakshara, as before, there is the Smriti-ćandrika and Dattaka-ćandrika of Devana-bhaṭṭa; Madhavācārya's commentary on Parāśara's Code (called Parāśara-smṛiti-vyākhyā); and Nanda-pandita's commentary on Vishnu's Code (called Vaijayanti), and on Parāśara's Code, and his treatise on the law of adoption called Dattaka-ćandrikā.

5. In the Western school (of Bombay and Mahā-rashtra), besides the Mitāksharā, certain treatises by Nilakanthabhaṭṭa, particularly one called Vyavahāra-mayūkha2, have the most weight.

1 Often called Miśra. His work has been translated by Prasanna Kumār Thākur, and printed at Calcutta in 1863. A copy was kindly sent to me by the translator.

2 A translation of this by Mr. H. Borrodaile of the Bombay Civil Service was published at Surat at the Mission Press in 1827.

LECTURE XII.

IV. The Itihasas or Epic Poems-The Rāmāyaṇa1.

IN

N India, literature, like the whole face of nature, is on a gigantic scale. Poetry, born amid the majestic scenery of the Himalayas, and fostered in a climate which inflamed the imaginative powers, developed itself with Oriental luxuriance, if not always with true sublimity. Although the Hindūs, like the Greeks, have only two great epic poems 2-the Rāmāyaṇa and Maha-bhāratayet to compare these vast compositions with the Iliad and the Odyssey, is to compare the Indus and the Ganges, rising in the snows of the world's most colossal ranges, swollen by numerous tributaries, spreading into vast shallows or branching into deep divergent channels, with the streams of Attica or the mountain-torrents of Thessaly. There is, in fact, an immensity of bulk about this, as about every other department of Sanskrit literature, which to a European mind, accustomed to a more limited horizon, is absolutely bewildering.

Nevertheless, a sketch, however imperfect, of the two

1 A portion of the matter of this Lecture and of that on the Mahābhārata was delivered by me as a public Lecture before the University of Oxford, on the 9th of May, 1862, and was afterwards published in a little work called 'Indian Epic Poetry,' which is now out of print.

* I am here speaking of that form of epic poetry which may be called natural and spontaneous as distinguished from artificial. Whether the Indian Epics (Itihāsas) or even the Iliad can be strictly said to answer Aristotle's definition of Epos, is another question. Artificial epic poems (Kavyas) are not wanting in later Sanskrit, and specimens will be given in a subsequent Lecture.

Indian Epics can scarcely fail to interest Occidental scholars; for all true poetry, whether European or Asiatic, must have features of resemblance; and no poems could have achieved celebrity in the East as these have done, had they not addressed themselves to feelings and affections common to human nature, and belonging alike to Englishmen and Hindus.

I propose, therefore, in the next three Lectures, to give a brief general idea of the character and contents of the Rāmāyaṇa and Mahā-bhārata', comparing them in some important particulars with each other, and pointing out the most obvious features of similarity or difference, which must strike every classical scholar who contrasts them with the Iliad and the Odyssey.

It is, of course, a principal characteristic of epic poetry, as distinguished from lyrical, that it should concern itself more with external action than internal feelings. It is this which makes Epos the natural expression of early national life. When centuries of trial have turned the mind of nations inwards, and men begin to speculate, to reason, to elaborate language and cultivate science, there may be no lack of refined poetry, but the spontaneous production of epic song is, at that stage of national existence, as impossible as for an octogenarian to delight in the giants and giant-killers of his childhood. The Rāmāyaṇa and Mahā-bhārata then, as reflecting the Hindu character in ancient times, may be expected to abound in stirring incidents of exaggerated heroic action.

Songs in celebration of great heroes were probably current in India quite as early as the Homeric poems in

1 In a second series of Lectures, which I hope will form a sequel to 'Indian Wisdom' and be published in a separate volume, the more complete analysis of the Rāmāyaṇa and Mahā-bhārata, given by me at the end of the little work called 'Indian Epic Poetry,' will probably be reprinted.