The verses which fall under § 4 are so numerous that after those of the first Mandala, mentioned above, they need not be given here in full. They are simply cases where the eighth syllable is not lengthened, and they cannot be supposed to run counter to any rule of the Prâtisâkhya, for the simple reason that the Prâtisâkhya never gave such a rule as that the eighth syllable must be lengthened, if the ninth is short. Examples will be found in the final pâda of Trishtubhs: II, 30, 6; III, 36, 4; 53, 15; 54, 12; IV, 1, 16; 2, 7; 9; 11; 4, 12; 6, 1; 2; 4; 7, 7; 11, 5; 17, 3; 23, 6; 24, 2; 27, 1; 28, 5; 55, 5; 57, 2; V, 1, 2; VI, 17, 10; 21, 8; 23, 7; 25, 5; 29, 6; 33, 1; 62, 1; 63, 7; VII, 21, 5; 28, 3; 42, 4; 56, 15; 60, 10; 84, 2; 92, 4; VIII, 1, 33; 96, 9; IX, 92, 5; X, 61, 12; 13; 74, 3; 117, 7.

In support of § 5.  ̄  ̄  ̄  ̄, the number of cases is smaller, but it should be remembered that it might be considerably increased if I had not restricted myself to the final pâda of each Trishtubh, while the first, second, and third pâdas would have yielded a much larger harvest:

§5.  ̄  ̄  ̄  ̄.

I, 89, 9. mâ no madhyâ rîrishatâ̄yūr gāntōh.

I, 92, 6. supratîkâ saumanasâ̄yâ̄gî̄gāh.

I, 114, 5; 117, 2; 122, 1; 122, 8; 186, 3; II, 4, 2; III, 49, 2; IV, 3, 9; 26, 6; V, 41, 14; VI, 25, 2; 66, 11; VII, 8, 6; 28, 4; 68, 1; 71, 2; 78, 1; 93, 7b; IX, 90, 4; X, 11, 8.

I do not wish to deny that in several of these lines it would be possible to remove the long syllable from the ninth place by conjectural emendation. Instead of â´yur in I, 89, 9, we might read â´yu; in I, 92, 6, we might drop the augment of agîgar; in II, 4, 2, we might admit synizesis in ă͡ră*tir, and then read gî̄ră-āsvāh, as in I, 141, 12. In VI, 25, 2, after eliding the a of ava, we might read d̆â̄sî̄h. But even if, in addition to all this, we were to admit the possible suppression of final m in asmabhyam, mahyam, and in the accusative singular, or the suppression of s in the nominative singular, both of which would be extreme measures, we should still have a number of cases which could not be righted without even more violent remedies. Why then should we not rather admit the occasional appearance of a metrical variation which certainly has a powerful precedent in the dispondeus of Gâyatrîs? I am not now acquainted with the last results of metrical criticism in Virgil, but, unless some new theories now prevail, I well recollect that spondaic hexameters, though small in number, much smaller than in the Veda, were recognised by the best scholars, and no emendations attempted to remove them. If then in Virgil we read,

'Cum patribus populoque, penatibusque et magnis dis,'

why not follow the authority of the best MSS. and the tradition of the Prâtisâkhyas and admit a dispondeus at the end of a Trishtubh rather than suspend, in order to meet this single difficulty, some of the most fundamental rules of prosody?