It is also impossible to accept the view that the Vedic drama died out under the chilling effect of the disapproval of the priests of fertility ritual. We find, on the contrary, that fertility ritual is fully recognized later in the Mahāvrata ceremonial, and also in the horse sacrifice, which are both known to the other Vedic Saṁhitās, though this feature of the rite is not referred to, directly at least, in the Ṛgveda. Moreover, even if the disapproval of fertility rites had been real, why should it have brought to a close the drama? The dialogues of Agni and the gods, of Saramā and the Paṇis, of Varuṇa and Indra, of Indra and the singer—and perhaps Vāyu also (viii. 100), have no connexion with fertility, and this aspect of drama need not have perished. Dr. Hertel is certainly right in demanding traces of development, not of decadence, but his great effort to find a full drama in the Suparṇādhyāya must definitely be pronounced a failure. It involves an elaborate invention of stage directions, the preparation of a list of dramatis personae largely on the basis of imagination, and a translation of the piece based on this theory, which can be shown in detail to be open to the certainty of error. Add to this the fact that there is no hint in Indian tradition that the Suparṇādhyāya, on the face of it a late imitation of Vedic work proper, had ever any dramatic intention or use. A very different theory of the purpose of these hymns is that which we owe to Professors Windisch, [16] Oldenberg, [17] and Pischel. [18] They represent an old type, Indo-European in antiquity, of composition of epic character, in which the verses, representing the points of highest emotion, were preserved, and the connecting links were in prose which was not stereotyped, and therefore has not come down to us. The theory is capable of combination with the suggestion that these hymns in dialogue were dramatic; thus Prof. Pischel explained the combination of prose and verse in the Sanskrit drama as a relic of this early form of literature, which thus might serve both epic and dramatic ends. [19] Despite the considerable vogue which the theory has at one time or other attained, and the energetic defence of it by Professor Oldenberg, who has based upon it an elaborate theory of the development of Indian prose, it is doubtful whether we can accept the view. [20] It is a very real difficulty here also that the tradition shows no trace of knowledge of this characteristic of the hymns, and we do not find any work actually in this form in the whole of the Vedic literature. The alleged instances of this type, such as those of the tale of Çunaḥçepa in the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa, or the working up in the Çatapatha Brāhmaṇa of the legend of Purūravas and Urvaçī cannot possibly be made to fit the theory. In the latter case we have a tale, which manifestly does not agree with the verses of the Ṛgveda, and which is openly and obviously an attempt to work that hymn into the explanation of the