Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/854

 $12. BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. [ Chap¥ the second and the third words, two letters each. If the first word has three letters, the second word must have three letters as well. That verse is defec- tive which violates this rule, though all the letters: counted in a line may come up to 14. The first line rhymes with the second and the two rhyming lines make an entire stanza. The word Payara has been evidently derived from the word Pada. The word ‘ Paya’ in Bengali which means the foot of a bedstead, or ‘ Tripaya’ which means a three-footed light-stand, illustrates the similar forms derived from the word Pada. The next favourite metre of the old poets was the Tripadi. The Tripadi was a verse of the Rig Veda containing three padas or hemistiches. The 11711008417. verses were called Tripada Riks (ade Panini IV, 1,9). This metre which is traced to the Rig Veda was adopted in Prakrita and through that channel passed into Bengali. In Tripadi as in the case of Payara, there was in the early times no hard and fast rule about the number of letters, but gradually as the study of metre reached perfection, the number of letters in each hemistich, of which there are three making a half stanza, was fixed. The first two {- ৬ ae : রত ——S the third half-line which rhymes with the 6th con- i half-lines which rhyme, contain six letters each, and | tains eight letters. Jayadeva introduced this Sans- kritic metre though without observing any definite number in the letters. Khyme was no necessary con- 010101), 11176 17911১19112 ' বুতিসুখসারে, গতমভিসারে মদ্ন- মনোহরবেশম্‌'+--১০)0১ as the keynote to the modern Tripadi in Bengali. In the next half-stanza, how- ever, ‘—9 ER নিতব্ষিনি, গমনবিলম্বন মনজপর ত্বং হৃদয়েশম্‌