The sage Vaishampáyana, a pandit or pedant lecturing on the Art of War, warns us that the ‘Efficiency of the weapon is subject to great changes. In different ages and places the quality of an arm is not the same, for the material and mode of construction greatly vary. Moreover, much depends upon the strength and ability of the person using such weapons, in preserving, increasing, or diminishing their efficiency.’ It may also be remarked that many of his weapons appear to be the results of a brain quickened by opium or hashísh.

The sage Shukra, or Preceptor of the Dæmons, also discourses learnedly, in his ‘Shukraniti,’ on armies and weapons, including firearms. The only practical part of chap. v. (Oppert, pp. 82–144) is his description of the lucky and unlucky marks on horses. The Arabs have a similar system, and a horse with inauspicious signs sells, however well bred, for a small sum. And there is wisdom in verse 242 (p. 124):—

As regards the Sword, Shukra says (Lib. iv. sect. vii. p. 109, verse 154):—

The Sword is a little curved and one-bladed; it is four-fingers broad, and sharp-pointed as a razor; it extends up to the navel, has a strong hilt, and is brilliant as the beautiful moon. The Khadga (two-handed Sword) is four cubits (or six feet) long,[708] broad at the hilt, and at the end-point sharp like a razor.

From neither of these works do we learn anything about an interesting subject—the elephant-Sword. It is mentioned by the Italian traveller Ludovico di Varthema (a.d. 1503–1508), who makes it two fathoms long and attached to the trunk. Athanasius Nikitin calls it a scythe. Knox in his ‘Ceylon’ also speaks of a sharp iron with a socket of three edges ‘placed on the teeth’ (tusks?). It was probably derived from the West. Antigonus, the great elephantarch; Seleucus, and Pyrrhus armed their beasts with ‘sharp points of steel in the tusks’—veritable Swords. In Da Gama’s day each animal wore ten blades, five to the tusk.[709]

It must be borne in mind that upper India about the beginning of our æra was mostly Buddhist, and consequently she bred men of peace. Yet the caves and the cave-temples supply in bas-relief specimens of Sword-bearers, and even of free fights. The weapon is mostly the short stout blade, corresponding with the Persian Acinaces, but worn in modern fashion on the left side. Mr. James Fergusson has kindly supplied me with two illustrations. The first (fig. 235) is the battle-scene showing two Swords. A huge chopper or falchion, with a tooth on the back, is wielded in the left hand, the right supporting the shield.[710] The other, straight with one median ridge, is broad at the end instead of being pointed. The second (fig. 236), which Mr. Fergusson calls the ‘first Highlander,’ is of the same date, and it shows very distinctly the handle—which might be modern—the sheath, and the mode of wearing. It is more distinct in the photograph than in the woodcut made by the author’s artist.

The temple-caves of Elephanta or Gharapuri (cave-town) in the Bay of Bombay, described by Forbes and Heber, Dr. Wilson and Mr. Burgess, show a very different and superior article. This comparatively modern basilica—burrowed out of the rock and dedicated to Shiva or Mahadeva, the third person of the Hindu Triad, and the representative of destructive-reproduction in his Trimurti or triple form—contains a multitude of alt-reliefs from ten to fourteen feet high, and so prominent that they are almost ‘undercut,’ joined to the parent-rock only by the back. At the north-east angle stands the figure of the hero Arjuna, the presumed ancestor of the Pandya Princes. This Brave, an especial favourite in Southern India,[711] holds, in the right hand, perpendicularly and point upwards, a short, straight blade, with a bevelled point like the Roman; there is a small hand-guard; the fist fills the grip, and the large pommel confines the hand, as is still the fashion throughout India.

The military tactics of the earlier Hindús are familiarly shown by our game of chess.[712] But their pandits and students, writing in the closet, borrowed or devised a whole body of ‘strategemata,’ making it easy to find amongst them the Phalanx, the Legion, the Wedge, or the Crescent attack.

Professor Oppert informs us[713] that the Arka (Calatropis gigantea), the huge swallow-wort with milky and blistering juice, which grows wild all over the peninsula, if ‘used with discretion when iron is being forged, contributes greatly to the excellence of the Indian steel.’ The simple is well known to the native alchemist, to the doctor, and to the vet., but I was not aware of its being generally applied to iron-working.

I reserve for Part II. details concerning the modern Indian Sword and the blades imitated from it. Lieutenant-Colonel Pollok (Madras Staff Corps)[714] describes, unfortunately without illustration, the Burmese Dalwel (‘Dalwey,’ vol. ii. p. 18) or fighting-Sword, a ‘nasty two-handed weapon with a blade about two feet long, and as sharp as a razor’ (i. 51). He also notices the Dha, or Dhaw, a knife six inches long, equally fitted for domestic use and stabbing.

Note.—My lamented friend Dr. Burnell, whose loss to Anglo-Oriental philology is so deeply felt, took a notable part in reducing Hindú claims to remote antiquity. Whereas Sir William Jones, a littérateur thoroughly well imposed upon, dated the Laws of Menu from a.d. 1280, Burnell boldly assigned them to the fourth century a.d., and partly to a much later period. The Theatre of Kalidása (Sakuntala, Urwasi, &c.) he has attributed to the sixth century instead of the first; in fact he leaves nothing to b.c. but parts of the Vedas and the earliest Buddhist texts.

We can accept the reform unhesitatingly. The oldest Hindú inscription (Girnár) dates from about b.c. 250; the oldest Cave-temple from still later. The alphabet is a lineal descendant from the Egypto-Phœnician. The earliest Hindú buildings were wooden: India had no architecture which could vie with those of Greece or monarchical Rome, much less with the mighty works of Egypt and Mesopotamia. The Hindú’s ‘iron-built’ cities were probably clay-walled settlements. His mythology was Egyptian tempered with Greek: for instance, the four Yugas or periods, in the fourth of which (Kali, the black Yuga) we now are. And considering how early Christianity found its way into the Peninsula, and the highly subjective and receptive nature of the people, I cannot but believe that they borrowed largely from the sacred writings of the stranger. It is easier to hold that Christ originated, or at least influenced, Krishna, than with Volney to hold Krishna the original of Christ. In 1852 Mr. Pocock wrote about ‘India in Greece’; in 1883 we want a change of venue to ‘Greece in India.’ ‘Yavana’ (Greek) entered India with Alexander, and this gives a terminus a quo though not ad quem.