________________
304
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
BOOK-NOTICES.
SOME NEW CATALOGUES OF SANSKRIT MSS.
WE have received Dr. Peterson's excellent Catalogue of the MSS. in the Ulwar Library.' It consists of a nominal list, with, in many cases, full descriptions of nearly two thousand five hundred works, to which is appended an unusually large collection of extracts, in which no less than six hundred and seventy-eight MSS. are illustrated. A third of the whole collection is devoted to Vedic works and works on Philosophy. Rhetoric, Dharma, and Astronomy are well repre. sented, and there is a small collection of Prakrit books, some of which appear to be of value, although this portion of the catalogue gives merely the titles, with few further particulars. The book is absolutely devoid of diacritical marks of any kind. Even long vowels are not noted, but in other respects, it is throughout edited with the scholarly accuracy which distinguishes all Dr. Peterson's labours.
The Government of Bengal is issuing in fasci. culi, a Catalogue of the MSS. in the Library of the Calcutta Sanskrit College. The first fasciculus has been printed at the Secretariat Press, and a wise discretion has been exercised in transferring the second and third to the Press of the Baptist Mission. Experience has shewn that Government printing departments are not adapted for the correct production of carefully edited Sanskrit books. The present work is as yet incomplete, and till the necessary indexes have been received it is difficult to analyze its contents. The style is the same as that of the well-known Sanskrit catalogues of Rajendra Lala Mittra, with which it may well be compared. When completed, it will, no doubt, be as useful as its fore-runner.
Let us hope that the Bengal Government, at whose expense it is issued, will make the book easily available to purchasers in Europe and not bury the copies (without advertisement) in the cellars of Writers' Buildings, to be sold as waste paper, after being given a decent number of years to ripen for the paper mills.
ORIENTAL MUSIC, a Monthly Periodical, Edited by A. M. CHINNASWAMI MUDALIYAR, M. A., Ave Maria Press, Pudupet, Madras, 1893.
THIS periodical appears to have been started with the following objects:- to familiarise the
1 Catalogue of the Sanskrit Manuscripts in the Library of His Highness the Maharaja of Ulwar, by Peter Peterson, M.A., D.Sc., Bombay: 1992,
A Descriptive Catalogue of the Banskrit MSS. in the Library of the Calcutta Sanskrit College. Part I.
[OCTOBER, 1895.
European ear with the peculiarities of Oriental Music; to help the people of the country to understand European Notation, and to appreciate the beauties of Harmony; and to record the music of India which is fast fading into decay.
It is a somewhat comprehensive programme, of which the third part would appear to be the most worthy of support.
A complete and trustworthy record of the musical productions of India, with descriptions of the instruments used, and the manner in which
they are manufactured and played, and accounts of the principal masters of Indian music, will be of great value to Orientalists, as, with the exception of Captain Day's work, no such record exists.
The European ear, with its previous training by the European scales and divisions of the octave, is not likely to appreciate the Oriental scales and divisions; and on our keyed instruments, as at present tuned, it is not possible to render Oriental Music correctly or to describe it in European Notation. On instruments of the Violin family this music can be played, but in the pages before us no indications are given in the notation by which this should be done.
With a specially devised notation Oriental music could be rendered on such an instrument as Mr. Bosanquet's Enharmonic Organ, but, as we have said, Europeans are not likely to seriously adopt Oriental Music.
To attempt to teach Harmony to the Indians from the starting point of their own music would be "ploughing the sands," and it would be far easier for them to approach the subject as a separate science, and to study the European textbooks.
"Oriental Music" is evidently the work of an enthusiast, and the record being made is a valuable addition to the literature of a little known subject. It is only by the investigation of Eastern music that we shall be able to understand the music of the ancient European nations, and Mr. Chinnaswami Mudaliyar will do good work for science in continuing what he has so carefully commenced. We would draw his attention to Notes and Queries on Anthropology, Chapter XLI., which he will find to be an excellent guide to the requirements of science in the matter.
(1892) by Hrishikêsa Sastri; printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press; Part II. (1894) by the same, and Siva Chandra Gui, M.A., B.L., printed at the Baptist Mission Press; Part III. (1895), same author and printer.
