One of the most beautiful and interesting paintings at the Royal Academy Exhibition of Indian Art (No. 472) was lent by the Asutosh University Museum, Calcutta. Two subjects, painted on both sides of a single sheet in reverse directions, represent the Milkmaids of Brindaban awaiting Krishna by the River Jumna on a moonlit night. The one not shown at the Exhibition is reproduced by Mr. D. P. Ghosh in the Journal of the Indian Society of Oriental Art (vol. ix, 1941, p. 112): the other is reproduced here (PL I).

“Comment, transplantée au Cambodge, à Java, et dans les autres pays, l'esthétique indienne a-t-elle donné naissance à l'art khmèr, à l'art javanais et aux autres arts hindous d'Extrême Orient ? C'est là, un des problèmes les plus délicats qui s'offre aux archéologues.” In those challenging words, on the last page of his recent valuable work of synthesis, M. Coedès indicates with his usual acumen a main goal of future Greater Indian research. It presents a formidable task indeed, calling for inquiry into the whole problem of culture change in Greater India.

The Prajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya sūtra is a religious document of the first importance. It carried Hiuen-tsiang through the Gobi desert, was reproduced, in writing, on stones, in recitation throughout Asia from Kabul to Nara, and formed one of the main inspirations of the Zen school, occupying in Buddhist mysticism about the same place the “Mystical Theology” of Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita occupied in Christian. Unlike other very short Prajñāpāramitā-sūtras, the Hṛdaya is of great philosophical interest. The Svalpākṣara, and other abbreviations, were designed to bring the benefits of Prajñāpāramitā within the reach of those unable either to study or understand it. The Hṛdaya alone can be said to have gone really to the heart of the doctrine. The historical analysis of its sources can contribute to the understanding of this sūtra, by restoring its component parts to their context in the larger Prajñāpāramitā sūtras.

The Chuvash language contains many words lacking a clear etymological relation to the Turco-Tatar languages (of which the Chuvash is a member) as well as to the neighbouring Finno-Ugrian languages. One of these odd expressions is the word for “knife”, zězě, which, according to Ashmarin's Thesaurus Linguæ Tschuvaschorum (vol. xiii, pp. 109–110), has no derivations in this language. Among the examples of the use shown there, one is of some interest for students of folklore and may therefore be inserted here in translation: “Having buried the maid they put a knife at her head, saying: Cut thou with this knife the bread yonder; and they put a needle and thread, saying: Sew the chemises with them.”

Dr. rudolf hoernle's Manuscript Remains of Buddhist Literature Found in Eastern Turkestan (1916) contains the collected fragments of the two most celebrated works ascribed to the Buddhist hymn-writer Mātṛceṭa, generally known as the Śatapañcāśatka and Catuḥśataka Stotras. The editor pointed out (p. 76) that in the Catuḥśataka fragments the poem is twice called Varṇārhavarṇa Stotra and that the Tibetan translation in the Tanjur, parts of which were published by Professor F. W. Thomas in the Indian Antiquary, vol. xxxiv, pp. 145 ff., gives it the same title. Further perplexities are indicated in Dr. Hoernle's note on the first fragment of the Catuḥśataka (Stein MSS., Khora 005a) which begins in his edition as follows:—

Obverse

1. xxxxxxxx x ṁ prayātu citto jagati x (dhayu) x (matiḥ) ‖ 100 (śloka) ‖ Prasādapratibhôdbhavo nāma buddha stotram xxxxxx

The correct interpretation of has presented a problem so far not satisfactorily solved. Acting on the a priori assumption that in the time of Gideon writing could hardly have been so generally diffused that a mere lad caught casually would write down the names of the chiefs of Sukkoth, the Revised Version renders, somewhat disingenuously, “and he [the lad] described for him [Gideon] the princes of Sukkoth, etc.” Realizing, however, that such a translation was quite indefensible lexicographically, it safeguarded itself by adding in the margin, “Or, wrote down.”