CHARACTERS AND SOUNDS. 11
a remarkable accordance with the Sanskrit rule of euphony before mentioned. From laupsin-u. "I praise," therefore comes laupsinau, "I shall praise;" as in Sanskrit fa hansydmi, "I shall kill," from the root han. In the Prakrit, not only them, but then, at the end of words, has always fallen into Anuswâra, without regard to the follow- ing letters Thus we read in Chezy's edition of the Sakun- talá, p. 70, ***, which is certainly to be pronounced, not bhaaram, but bhaavan, for na bhagavan; [G. Ed. p. 12.] kudhan, for kutham.[1]
11. The second of the signs before mentioned is named
Visarga, which signifies abandonment. It expresses a breath-
ing, which is never primitive, but only appears at the end
of words in the character of an euphonic alteration of
स् 8 and र.. These two letters (s, r) are very mutable
at the end of words, and are changed into Visarga before a
pause or the deadened letters of the guttural and labial
classes (§. 12.). We write this sign h to distinguish it from
the true DEV h.
12. The proper consonants are classed in the Sanskrit
alphabet according to the organs used in their pronunciation;
and form, in this division, five classes. A sixth is formed by
the semi-vowels, and a seventh by the sibilants and the
DEV h. In the first five ranks of these consonants the single
letters are so arranged, that the first are the surd or hard
consonants, the thin (tenues), and their aspirates; next, the
sonant or soft, the medials, and their aspirates, each class
being completed by its nasal. The nasals belong, like the
vowels and semi-vowels, to the sonants; the sibilants to the
surd or hard. Every thin and every medial letter has its
corresponding aspirate. The aspirates are pronounced, like their
- ↑ No native scholar would read these as bhaavaṇ or kudhaṇ, as the text affirms, but bha-avam, kudham, agreeably to the final DEV represented by Anuswara.—Editor.
