Page:Sanskrit Grammar by Whitney p1.djvu/386

 in AV., and very rare elsewhere in the older language;  is found nine times in RV. (only once outside the tenth Book), twice in AV., and but half-a-dozen times elsewhere (in ÇB., once from a causative stem: ). The historical relation of the three forms is obscure.

c. Two other gerund suffixes, and. are mentioned by the grammarians as of Vedic use, but they have nowhere been found to occur.

994. The use of this gerund, though not changing in its character, becomes much more frequent, and even excessive, in the later language.

a. Thus, in the Nala and Bhagavad-Gītā, which have only one tenth as many verb-forms as RV., there are more than three times as many examples of the gerund as in the latter.

b. In general, the gerund is an adjunct to the subject of a sentence, and expresses an act or condition belonging to the subject: thus, (RV.) smiting with his thunderbolt, he poured forth the waters;  (RV.) having drunk of the soma, he waxed strong;  (ÇB.) having sucked out the sap of the offering, having milked the offering dry, having blocked it with the sacrificial post, they disappeared;  (MBh.) and having heard, they said;  (H.) and having seen him in the distance, thinking 'it is a she-ass.', he ran.

c. But if the logical subject, the real agent, is put by the construction of the sentence in a dependent case, it is still qualified by the gerund: thus, (RV.) it distresses the gambler (i. e. the gambler is distressed) at seeing a woman;  (ÇB.) fear came upon him (i. e. he was afraid) when he saw him;  (M.) when he stays away after providing for her support;  (MBh.) what, I wonder, would happen to me if I did this; — and especially, when a passive form is given to the sentence, the gerund qualifies the agent in the instrumental case (282 a): thus,  (H.) thereupon he was slain by the tiger, who recognized him by his voice;  (Ç.) presenting Çakuntalā, thou must say to the king;  (gen. for instr.)  (MBh.) as the Nishadhan was chosen by me on hearing the words of the swans: this construction is extremely common in much of the later Sanskrit.

d. Occasionally, the gerund qualifies an agent, especially an indefinite one, that is unexpressed: thus, (H.) then he shall be eaten [by us] cooking him on the spot;  (M.) that, after being promised (lit. when one has promised her) to one, she is given again to another;  (H.) what one says after mature thought,