Auld lang syne. Second series : $b My Indian friends — John Shaqi
Auld lang syne. Second series : $b My Indian friendsMüller, F. Max (Friedrich Max)
History
Auld lang syne. Second series : $b My Indian friends
Müller, F. Max (Friedrich Max)
India; Müller, F. Max (Friedrich Max), 1823-1900 -- Friends and associates
the reality of that vision, I should probably never have thought of my
copybook again.
NOTE.—In Sanskrit words an italic _k_ should be pronounced like
English “ch” in church, italic _g_ like “j” in join. Thus, mle_kkh_a,
or, as some used to spell it, mlechchha, should be pronounced like
mlêcha. Proper names, however, and Oriental words that have already a
recognised spelling in English, have mostly been left unchanged.
It was when I had left school, and had gone to the University of Leipzig
in 1841, that my vision, like a _revenant_, appeared again, and assumed
then a more tangible and permanent form. I was getting a little tired of
Greek and Latin, and the warmed-up cabbage, the _crambe repetita_, of
Homer and Horace, when I heard of the foundation of a new Chair—a Chair
of Sanskrit—and saw lectures on Indian literature advertised by
Professor Brockhaus. Here my curiosity was roused at once; I had already
had a slight flirtation with Arabic, but now I fell seriously in love
with Sanskrit, and became more and more faithless to my first classical
love. Professor Brockhaus was an excellent, kind-hearted, and helpful
teacher. I began Sanskrit with a will, and, after I had attended his
lectures for several semesters at Leipzig, and had read with him such
ordinary books as Nala, Sakuntalâ, and even a little of the Rig-Veda, I
went to Berlin to study under Bopp; and then proceeded to Paris,
attracted by the fame of Eugène Burnouf.
At that time my desire to see India, as I had seen it in the visions of
my schooldays, became very strong. As classical scholars yearn to see
Rome or Athens, I yearned to see Benares, and to bathe in the sacred
waters of the Ganges. But at that time such a thing was simply out of
the question. At that time to go to India seemed to be the privilege of
Englishmen only, and it took half a year to get there, and a great deal
more money than I could command. The dream of my life to see India face
to face has never been realised. When I was young enough, I had not the
wherewithal to go there, and when, later in life, I was invited again
and again by my Indian friends to go there, I was too old and too much
tied down by duties from which there was no escape. Besides, unless I
could have stayed in India at least two or three years, could have
learned to speak the languages, and come to know the few native scholars
still left, it was nothing to me. My India was not on the surface, but
lay many centuries beneath it; and as to paying a globe-trotter’s visit
to Calcutta and Bombay, I might as well walk through Oxford Street and
Bond Street But, though I never stood on the ghats of Benares, and never
saw the men, women, and children step down from them into the sacred
waters of the Ganges, I have had the good fortune of knowing a number of
Indians in Europe, and no doubt some of the best and most distinguished
of the sons and daughters of India. I have often been told that I have
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