________________
SEPTEMBER, 1878.]
Of Bhakti-thatcompound of rioris and dyámn, the introduction of which into India I think (with Weber) is due to the influence of Christianity-the first chapter of the Kurra! is a beautiful exposition.
These topics will be further illustrated when we proceed to the consideration of the text itself.
The Kurra! owes much of its popularity to its exquisite poetic form. A kurra! is a couplet containing a complete and striking idea expressed in a refined and intricate metre. No translation can convey an idea of its charming effect. It is truly an apple of gold in a network of silver. Something of the same kind is found in the Latin elegiac verse. There is a beauty in the periodic character of the Tamil construction in many of these verses that reminds the reader of the happiest efforts of Propertius. Probably the Tamil sage adopted it as being the best representative ia Tamil of the Sanskrit sloka.
The brevity rendered necessary by the form gives an oracular effect to the utterances of the great Tamil Master of the sentences.'
NOTES ON THE KURRAL.
The choice of the most difficult metre in the language for a long work showed that the author intended to expend upon it his utmost of power, and to make it a 'possession for ever,' a 'delight of many generations.'
Of the laws of this metre, as a great curiosity, and as being quite unique in prosody, I will try to give the English reader some general ideas. I venture to refer the student of Tamil to my Third Tamil Grammar for a more complete exposition. In the Clavis humaniorum litterarum sublimioris Tamulici idiomatis, by the great Beschi, the whole subject of Tamil poetry is discussed. Dr. A. C. Burnell, M.C.S. (among his very many benefactions to Oriental learning), has issued a reprint of this valuable work, which is most faithful to its native sources, some of which I have printed in my Third Grammar. A. The feet admissible in the kurra! metre are called
I. 1. témá
2. pulima. II. 3. kúvilam 4. karuvilam...
III. 5. témángái
...
6. pulimángái.
a spondee. an anapæst. a dactyl. a proceleusmaticus.
a molossus. an ionicus a minore.
IV. 7. kúvilangái.. 8. karuvilangái u
a choriambus.
the same with first long resolved.
V. The last foot in the second line of a kurra! may be
9. nál a single long syllable.
10.
11.
223
-
ka su: the same with a very short ú. mălăr: a pyrrhic.
12. pirup pu: the same with a very short i, hardly sounded at all.
B. Of these feet the former line of the kurra! contains three, which may (observing the proper sequence-see I. below) be any of those numbered 1-8; the latter line consists also of three feet, of which the last must be one of the short feet numbered 9-12.
C. Classical ideas of arsis, thesis, and ictus must be dismissed; each metrically short or long syllable is simply pronounced, without any accent, a slight pause marking the end of each foot. The voice lingers on the long syllable, and hurries over the short, but with no inflexion or emphasis, except that of the tune or chant.
D. There must be no caesura: in no part of a line can the end of a word coincide with the middle of a foot. Very closely related words-words in construction with one another
may be taken as one word; but every foot is. with this explanation, a single word.
E. The difficulty arises that a word may consist of three short syllables, or of a long syllable followed by a short (trochee). What feet are these? The former is pulima, the latter téma: every tribrach is treated as a dactyl, and every trochee as a spondee-the single short syllable is lengthened in the pause.
The first kurra! of Tiruvalluvar transliterated runs thus:
ăgără mădălă | ĕrutt' ellām; | ādi păgăvän müdăṭṭě | ülăgă | This is scanned
pulimâ pulimâ pulimângâi | têmâ pulimâ pulimâ 1 pirappu |
The rhythm is anapastic.
F. Syllables are not generally long or short, in Tamil, by position; the vowel alone counts.
G. Tamil verse has a rhyme at the beginning, never at the end-a peculiarity found in some Celtic poetry.
H. There must also be, in general, an assonance or alliteration in each line, as in Saxon and Scandinavian poetry. To this the Tamil
