Page:A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India Vol 1.djvu/77

Rh variety of the printed. Sindhi has remained till modern times almost unwritten. The rude scrawls in use among the mercantile classes defy analysis, and were so imperfect that it is said no one but the writer himself could read what was written. The abandonment of the mâtrâ or top line of the Devanâgari letters, is a common feature in all these cursive alphabets. It is either dropped entirely, as in the Kayathi character used in Behar, or a series of lines are ruled across the page first, like a schoolboy’s copy-book, and the writing is hung on below as in the Moḍh or "twisted" current hand of the Marathas. Gujarati, for some reason, has taken to printing books in this cursive hand, without the top line, which gives it at first sight the effect of a totally different character. The letters are all, however, pure modern Nâgarî, and on showing a Gujarati book to a native of Tirhut, I found he could read it perfectly, and, what is more, very nearly understand most parts of it; and he was by no means an exceptionally intelligent man, rather the reverse.

The Mahâjani character differs entirely from that used for general purposes of correspondence, and is quite unintelligible to any but commercial men. It is in its origin as irregular and scrawling as the Sindhi, but has been reduced by men of business into a neat-looking system of little round letters, in which, however, the original Devanagari type has become so effaced as hardly to be recognizable, even when pointed out. Perhaps this is intentional. Secresy has always been an important consideration with native merchants, and it is probable that they purposely made their peculiar alphabet as unlike anything else as possible, in order that they alone might have the key to it.