March, 1873.] DATE OF SRI HARSIIA 71 Goidstucker agrees with him. But it is a ques¬ tion whether the distinction between northern or eastern grammarians, which Panini mentions, really existed in the time of Katyayana. But to whatever school of grammarians he may have belonged, supposing such schools existed in his time, it appears, from a passage in the Maha¬ bhashya, that the author of the Vurtikas was a Dakshinatya, i.e., a native of the South or Dak- khan. In the introduction to the Mahabhashya* occurs a passage, the sense of which is this:— “If a man, who wishes to express his thoughts, does so by using some words or other simply from his acquaintance with the usage of the world, what is the use of grammar ? The object of gram¬ mar is to restrict the liberty of speech in such a manner that religious good may arise from it; just as is done in the affairs of the world and in matters concerning the Vedas. In the world we find people saying ‘ a domesticated cock should not be eaten, a domesticated pig should not be eaten.’ Things are eaten for the satisfaction of hunger. Hunger, however, can be satisfied even by eating dog’s flesh, and such other things. But then though it is so, a restraint is put on us, and we are told such a thing is eatable and such a thing is uneatable. * * * In the same manner, while one is able to express his thoughts equally by correct or incorrect words, what grammar does is to restrict him to the use of correct words, in order that religious good may arise from it.” Now, this is Patanjali’s explanation of two vartikas, the latter of which is yathd laukika- vaidikeshu, i.e., ‘ as in the world and in the Veda.’ On this Patanjali’s remark is Priya-taddhitd Dakshindtydh yathd loke vede che.ti prayoktavye yathd laukika-vaidikeshviti prayunjate, i.e., the Dakshinntyas, i. e., people of the South or Dakkhan, are fond of using (words with) taddhita affixes, that is, instead of saying yathd loke vede cha, they say yathd laukika-vaidikeshu” (i.e., instead of using the words loka and veda, they use derivatives from them, formed by affixing the termination ika). This clearly means that Katyayana, the author of the vartika in which the words laukika and Vaidika occur, was a Dakshinatya. THE DATE OF SRl HARSIIA. By KA'SHIXA'TH TRIMBAK TELANG, M.A., In my article and letter on the date of the Nyayakusumanjali in the Indian Antiquary (vol. I. pp. 297 and 353), the question of the date of Sri Ilarsha, the author of the Naishadha Charita and other works, came incidentally under consideration ; and in my letter I made a reference to the conclusion which had been arrived at on that point by Dr. J. G. Biihler, as I knew it from a summary of his paper on the subject. I have since seen the whole of his paper on the age of the Naishadha Charita of Sri Harsha, and although I cannot say that my view on the subject continues quite unshaken, I still think that the question cannot yet be re¬ garded as finally settled. In the first place, then, the authority upon which Dr. Biihler relies for the date of Sri Harsha gives an account of him, which, .as the Doctor himself very truly remarks, “ is in many details obviously fanciful.”! And though I am willing to concede that this circumstance may easily l>e too much insisted on, it must be acknowledged that this account should be re¬ ceived with considerable caution. Dr. Biihler • Ballantyne’s Edn. pp. 64, 66. f Page 5.—My references ore to the essay as recently L.L.B., ADVOCATE, HIGH COURT, BOMBAY. points out two circumstances tending to show that the “main facts” related by RajaSekhara, the Jaina writer who gives us this account of Sri Harsha, are “ strictly historical.” I will take his second circumstance first. It is that “ Raja- sekhara’s narration agrees in some important details with the statements which Sri Harsha makes regarding himself in his own works.”! Now, I cannot attach much weight to this cir¬ cumstance ; for, surely, even a Hindu biographer, void of the “ historical sense,” could not afford either to ignore or to contradict such well-known autobiographical statements as those to which Dr. Biihler alludes. Running counter to such statements, a biography may, in the majority of cases at any rate, bo safely put down as a work of romance. But it does not therefore follow, I think, that the repetition of them in a work is proof of the remaining statements being trust¬ worthy. Had the case been somewhat different —had the statements coincided with what some elaborate historical investigation had brought out, or with facts which could be reached only by a course of bond fide historical research—the published m a separate pamphlet. X Rage 6.
