Page:The Sanskrit Drama.djvu/23

 18 Dramatic Elements be found, and to find it in ritual drama is illegitimate, and the only justification for accepting the view in any case must lie in the fact that it affords a better explanation of the hymn than any which can be given otherwise. It is impossible to feel any certainty that the necessary proof has been brought in any case. The hymn ix. 112, which describes in four stanzas in a rather humorous style the various ends of men, ending with the refrain in each case, 'O Soma, flow for Indra', is transformed into the marching song of a popular festival at which mummers represent vegetation deities and symbols of fertility are carried. The tradition knows nothing of these happenings, and the hymn certainly suggests none to the average intelligence. On the contrary, it seems a very natural piece of witty sarcasm, to which point is lent by the use of the refrain, and to deny the possibility of sarcasm to the thinkers who produce the advanced and sceptical views. expressed in the Rgveda is certainly unwise. To explain the Vṛṣākapi hymn (x. 86) as a piece of fertility magic in dramatic form is ingenious, but unluckily it in no way contributes towards the explanation of the hymn, and, therefore, is as valueless as the other possible explanations which have been offered. The same condemnation must be passed on the effort to find a mimic race at a festival described in the strange Mudgala hymn (x. 102) which if it is intelligible at all, seems to have a mythological reference, and not to refer either to actual or mimic races. An ingenious effort is that made to adduce ethnological parallels to prove that the hymn x. 119, which is a straight- forward monologue, placed in the mouth of Indra, celebrating the effect of drinking the Soma, must be regarded as part of a ritual in which at the close of the drinking of the Soma in the rite, a priest comes forward, assuming the rôle of Indra, and celebrates in monologue the strength of the juice of the holy plant Among the Cora Indians, after a wine festival, a god is introduced showing the effects of the drink, while a singer celebrates its potent merits. There is, however, a fatal hiatus in the proof; the poem by itself is perfectly clear, and to seek 1 This is quite consistent with the ritual use in a Soma 'wish' offering suggested by Oldenberg, GGA. 1909, pp. 79 ff. Cf. his remarks on vii. 103 in Rgveda-Noten, ii. 67.