of Assamese literature. Although in the light of more intensive research some of the conclusions or inferences arrived at by the author, such as the racial affinities of the kolitas, may perhaps require to be revised. The present volume wil long remain the standard grammar of the Assamese language. It is indeed a valuable contribution to Indian linguistics. (Ra Bahadur) Sarat Chandra Roy ORIENTAL LITERARY DIGEST Vol. I, No. 9: March 1938, page 12-13 The present work is due to the labours of a busy civil servant in the midst of his manifold official activities and as such is a monument to the industry and application of a bygone generation of civilians. Whatever faults there are in this work are offset by the amount of properly arranged raw material in the Assamese field for a better linguistic approach to this branch of Indo-Aryan, | The Introduction which is in English gives a short account of Assamese grammar and origin of the language. The first section deals with the origin of the language and the second with the different elements in its vocabulary: the third and fourth are devoted to the history of Assamese literature. The main part of the work is in Assamese and deals solely with a descriptive and at times historical grammar of the language. | The usefulness of the book is beyond question as it is a carefu collection of all available Assamese material, but is limited by the author's own admission of his ignorance of modern research in Indo-Aryan Linguistics. The documentation in the Introduction shows that the author has spent the best part of his life with the older generation of scholars. References to I.A are to Max MULLER's books while there is absolutely no mention of the fundamental work in the I-A field by Bloch, Chatterji or Turner. Despite these linnitations and lack of proper training on the part of the author this work has a unique value on two counts at least :-(a) it is the most comprehensive descriptive grammar of Assamese upto now published and (b) it is the sincerest effort of pure selfless love accom- plished under difficult circumstances. We congratulate the author on the first count and offer him our unstinted homage on the second. Such selfless work in the cause of the motherland is worth its weight in gold in spite of other limitations. May it open the eyes of the younger generation and those who have the requisite training but not the enthusiastic interest. S. M. Katre
