xistence. The repertoire, consisting of a few stories at
first, has gradually grown to such a size that now it may almost be
considered to contain the largest and best collection of stories that
the world has, as yet seen.

Mention has been already made in a previous page of the 'Katha Sarit
Sagara,' or Ocean of the Streams of Story, and a brief description of
this work was given in the third chapter of 'Early Ideas' (A.D. 1881).
Since then a complete translation of the 'Katha' has been made by
Professor C.H. Tawney, of the Calcutta College, and it has been
published in fourteen fasciculi, in the 'Bibliotheca Indica,' by the
Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1880-1887. It is to be regretted, for the
sake of the student and the anthropologist, that the translation is
presented in an expurgated form. Still, the Professor has done his
work (and a long and tedious work it must have been) excessively well,
while many of his notes, corrigenda and addenda are most interesting.

The 'Arabian Nights' and the 'Katha Sarit Sagara' occupy respectively
the same position in Arabic and Hindoo literature. They are both
collections of tales adapted to the people of the country for which
they have been written. A perusal of both the works will show how much
they differ. The characters and ideas of the heroes and heroines,
their thoughts, reflections, speeches, surroundings, and situations
are worth studying in the two books as an exposition of the manners
and customs, ideas and habits of two distinct peoples. The Hindoo
characters, as depicted in their story-book, will be found to be
duller, heavier, more reverential, and more superstitious than the
characters in the 'Nights.' There are two things, however, common to
the two books: the power of destiny, and the power of love, against
which it is apparently useless to struggle.

While there are 426 stories in Burton's 'Nights,' there are 330 tales
of sorts in Tawney's 'Katha.' Both works are rather formidable as
regards size and quantity of matter; still, after a start has been
fairly made, the interest goes on increasing in a wonderful way, until
at last one becomes absorbed and interested to a degree that can
scarcely be imagined.

The stories in the 'Katha Sarit Sagara' are supposed to have been
originally composed by one Gunadhya, in the Paisacha language, and
made known in Sanscrit under the title of 'Vrihat Katha,' or Great
Tale. From this work one Bhatta Somadeva, in the eleventh cent