2. The long î and û are treated as short, not only before vowels, which is legitimate, but also before consonants.

VII, 62, 4. dyâ̄vâ̄bhû̄mî̄ ădĭtē trâ̄s̍î̄̆thâ̄m nāh (see Trisht. § 5).

The forms î̄sî̄yā and râ̄sî̄yā in VII, 32, 18, occur at the end of octosyllabic or Gâyatra pâdas, and are therefore

perfectly legitimate, yet Professor Kuhn would change them too, into î̄sî̆yā and râ̄sî̆yā. In VII, 28, 4, even mâyî is treated as mâ̄yî̆ (see Trisht. § 5); and in VII, 68, 1, vî̄tām as vî̆tām. If, in explanation of this shortening of vîtam, vîhi is quoted, which is identified with vĭhi, this can hardly be considered as an argument, for vĭhĭ occurs where no short syllable is required, IV, 48, 1; II, 26, 2; and where, therefore, the shortening of the vowel cannot be attributed to metrical reasons.

3. Final m followed by an initial consonant is allowed to make no position, and even in the middle of a word a nasal followed by a liquid is supposed to make positio debilis. Several of the instances, however, given in support, are from Gâyatra pâdas, where Professor Kuhn, in some of his later articles, has himself allowed greater latitude; others admit of different scanning, as for instance,

I, 117, 8. măhāh kshōnāsyă āsvĭnâ̄ kānvâ̄yā.

Here, even if we considered the dispondeus as illegitimate, we might scan kă͡nv̆*â̄yă, for this scanning occurs in other places, while to treat the first a as short before nv seems tantamount to surrendering all rules of prosody.

4. Final n before semivowels, mutes, and double n before vowels make no position a. Ex. III, 49, I. yāsmī̆n vīsvâ̄ (Trisht. § 5);. I, 174, 5. yāsmĭ̄ñ kâ̄kān; I, 186, 4. sāsmĭn(n) û̄dhān b.

5. Final Visarga before sibilants makes no position c. Ex. IV, 21, 10. sātyă̄h sāmrâ̄t (Trisht. § 5). Even in I, 63, 4.

[paragraph continues] kōdî̆̅h să̅khâ̄ (probably a Gâgata), and V, 82, 4. sâ̄vî̄̆h sāubhăgām (a Gây. § 7), the long î is treated as short, and the short a of sakhâ is lengthened, because an aspirate follows.

6. S before mutes makes no position. Ex. VI, 66, II. ūgrâ̄ ā̆spridhrān (Trisht. § 3).

7. S before k makes no position. Ex. vīsvā̆skāndrâ̄h, &c.

8. Mutes before s make no position. Ex. rā̆kshās, according to Professor Kuhn, in the seventh Mandala only, but see I, 12, 5; kū̆tsa, &c.

9. Mutes before r or v make no position. Ex. sŭsī̆prā, dî̄rghā̆srūt.

10. Sibilants before y make no position. Ex. dā̆syû̄n.

11. R followed by mutes or sibilants makes no position. Ex. â̄yū̆r gî̄văsē, khā̆rdīh, vā̆rshīshthām.

12. Words like smā̆ddīshtî̄n, &c. retain their vowel short before two following consonants.

We now proceed to consider a number of prosodial rules which Professor Kuhn proposes to repeal in order to have a long syllable where the MSS. supply a short: