and for rules that might seem to differ from those of any of my predecessors, a reference to Pâṇini or to other native authorities. This I have done, and in so doing I had to re-write nearly the whole of my grammar; but though the time and trouble expended on this work have been considerable, I believe that they have not been bestowed in vain. I only regret that I did not give these authoritative references throughout the whole of my work[1], because, even where there cannot be any difference of opinion, some of my readers might thus have been saved the time and trouble of looking through Pâṇini to find the Sûtras that bear on every form of the Sanskrit language. By this process which I have adopted, I believe that on many points a more settled and authoritative character has been imparted to the grammar of Sanskrit than it possessed before; but I do by no means pretend to have arrived on all points at a clear and definite view of the meaning of Pâṇini and his successors. The grammatical system of Hindu grammarians is so peculiar, that rules which we should group together, are scattered about in different parts of their manuals. We may have the general rule in the last, and the exceptions in the first book, and even then we are by no means certain that exceptions to these exceptions may not occur somewhere else. I shall give but one instance. There is a root जगृ jâgṛi, which forms its Aorist by adding इषं isham, ईः îḥ, ईत् ît. Here the simplest rule would be that final ऋ ṛi before इषं isham becomes र् r (Pâṇ. VI. 1, 77). This, however, is prevented by another rule which requires that final ऋ ṛi should take Guṇa before इषं isham (Pâṇ. VII. 3, 84). This would give us अजागरिषं ajâgar-isham. But now comes another general rule (Pâṇ. VII. 2, 1) which prescribes Vṛiddhi of final vowels before इषं isham, i.e. अजागारिषं ajâgarisham. Against this change, however, a new rule is cited (Pâṇ. VII. 3, 85), and this secures for जागृ jâgṛi a special exception from Vṛiddhi, and leaves its base again as जागर् jâgar. As soon as the base has been changed to जागर् jâgar, it falls under a new rule (Pâṇ. vII. 2, 3), and is forced to take Vṛiddhi, until this rule is again nullified by Pâṇ. VII. 2, 4, which does not allow Vṛiddhi in an Aorist that takes intermediate इ i, like अजागरिषं ajâgarisham. There is an exception, however,
- ↑ They have been given in the second edition.
