scientifically explaining the Vedic language. Like other Sanskritists I am of opinion that Whitney underrated the value of the native commentators and grammarians, and his very last labors I do not consider very successful. But nobody will deny that he always dealt with his subject in a scholarly way, and the flourishing state of Sanskrit studies in America shows better than many words could do what he has been to his country.
It has not been my good luck to personally know Professor Whitney, but I wish to be added to the large number of scholars who lament his untimely death and consider it an irreparable loss to science.
Dear Sir,—Your invitation that I should contribute to a general record of Professor Whitney is an honor of which I am highly sensible. He was to me the type of literary honesty and thoroughness, and my admiration of him was as unqualified as it was sincere. As soon as the news of his death reached me I wrote at the spur of the moment an obituary notice[1] for the "Athenæum" (a copy of which was on publication sent to Mrs. Whitney); and as I should, beyond a few formal corrections which I had no opportunity to make at the time, scarcely desire to make any alteration in what I there stated, I trust you will consider that notice as the response to your invitation so far as it concerns my appreciation of his character. My intercourse with him was at all times of the friendliest, and I only regret that in the latter years I should have been rather
- ↑ See below, p. 153, No. 17.
