JOURNAL

OF THE

ASIATIC SOCIETY.

PART I-HISTORY, LITERATURE, &c.

No. III.-1867.

On the Arabic Element in Official Hindustani.-No. 2. By
J. BEAMES, Esq., B. C. S.

[Received 23rd July, 1866.]

"If Hindustani, adopted by us as the future general language of India, is to be a language and not a jargon, it must become so by means of its alliance with Persian, the speech which all Indian Mahomedans have at their heart, and use as the feeder, or channel of other feeders, for all their abstract thought, their politics, science, and poetry."*

This extract serves as a fitting text to the subject which it is my aim to illustrate. In a former paper I gave an outline of some arguments in favour of the present Arabicized dialect of our courts, and as the little literature which the language possesses is written in the same style, the following remarks may be considered as applicable to the literary style also. In the present I propose to review the assertions of the upholders of the opposite opinion, which may briefly, and I trust fairly, be stated thus:-In writing or

.

Quarterly Review No. 234, page 517 on Vámbéry's Travels in Central Asia."