Page:Atharva-Veda samhita.djvu/30

xxiv and the second part appeared in fact as a thin Heft of about 70 pages, giving book xx. in full, and that only. To it was prefixed a half-sheet containing the definitive preface and a new title-page. The definitive preface is dated October, 1856, and adds an eighth item, exegetical notes, to the promises of the provisional preface. The new title-page has the words "Erster Band. Text," thus implicitly promising a second volume, in which, according to the definitive preface, the accessory material was to be published.

Relation of this work to the "First volume" and to this Series.—Of the implicit promise of that title-page, the present work is intended to complete the fulfilment. As most of the labor upon the first volume had fallen to Whitney, so most of the labor upon the projected "second" was to have been done by Roth. In fact, however, it turned out that Roth's very great services for the criticism and exegesis of this Veda took a different form, and are embodied on the one hand in his contributions to the St. Petersburg Lexicon, and consist on the other in his brilliant discovery of the Kashmirian recension of this Veda and his collation of the text thereof with that of the Vulgate. Nevertheless, as is clearly apparent (page xvii), Whitney thought and spoke of this work as a "Second volume of the Roth-Whitney edition of the Atharva-Veda," and called it "our volume" in writing to Roth (cf. p. lxxxvi); and letters exchanged between the two friends in 1894 discuss the question whether the "second volume" ought not to be published by the same house (F. Dümmler's) that issued the first in 1856. It would appear from Whitney's last letter to Roth (written April 10, 1894, shortly before his death), that he had determined to have the work published in the Harvard Series, and Roth's last letter to Whitney (dated April 23) expresses his great satisfaction at this arrangement. This plan had the cordial approval of my friend Henry Clarke Warren, and, while still in relatively fair health, he generously gave to the University the money to pay for the printing.

External form of this work.—It is on account of the relation just explained, and also in deference to Whitney's express wishes, that the size of the printed page of this work and the size of the paper have been chosen to match those of the "First volume." The pages have been numbered continuously from 1 to 1009, as if this work were indeed one volume; but, since it was expedient to separate the work into two halves in binding, I have done so, and designated those halves as volumes seven