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APPENDIX.
based on the readings of recognised Hindu commentators themselves; nor have they been condemned by the Hindus generally.
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made into pleasant food well- this pleasant offering which is prepared by an apt cook ac- brought with the horse."
cording to the modes dictated
by specific knowledge of the properties of foods."
,
The italics are ours: and their force will be appreciated by any one who would but bear in mind the statement of Swami Dayananda that the sukta in question "is an exposition of ashwa vidya which means the science of training horses and the science of heat which pervades every where in the shape of electricity." (The Terminology of the Vedas, p. 38). Unfortunately for this reading, the relevancy of training horses or of excellence in the culinary art is not in any way made clear or established by good reason.
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There is little, if any, merit, indeed, in the other version also, if taken in a literal sense; but its relevancy is apparent from its general conformity to an actually prevalent usage which has undoubtedly descended from great antiquity.
It is no doubt, true that the Vedic terms are almost wholly yaugic (derivative), as opposed to rurhi whose sense is arbitrarily fixed by men; but it is equally true that practically the whole vocabulary of the Sanskrit language consists of words coined from simple roots by definite etymological processes. This peculiarity has extended itself even to proper nouns-names of persons especially, e.g., Rama is he who causes delight or is delightful and pleasing. Thus, it is always possible to question the validity of any particular version from one point of view or another, but it is evident that no satisfactory results can be arrived at in this manner.
In many instances root-meaning would be a sufficient index to the sense of words, but often it would be necessary to resort to the current or acquired expression to get at the truth, care being taken not to sacrifice away the sense of relevancy of things by an overzealous attitude of mind to establish a favourite view. For this reason, it would not be correct to say that Indra always means 'the governing people' and nothing but the governing people, Agni, never 14
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