It has been stated before, that each Veda consists of a collection of hymns—the Sanhitt portion—and of a Brahmau'a portion, which is especially intended for the explanation of the rites at the performance of which the hymns were employed. This division is maintained in its purity so far as the Rig- and SAma-veda are concerned. It is greatly obscured, however, in the Taittirlya-SanhitA, or that of the "Black" Yajur-veda. There, verses and description of ritual occur promis cuously ; it ie in reality a text-book for the guidance of the Adhwaryu priest, while the Hotri and Udgeitri had to study their special ritual books,in order to know when any particular verse of their Sanhitis ought to come in at a certain rite. This motley character of the Taittirtya Sanhita is probably indicated by the epithet " Black," or " Dark," which is given to the oldest recension of the Yajurveda ; and though the Tittiris may be a real proper name, the meaning of this word being " partridge," it is not impossible that this coincidence suggested the etymological legend mentioned above. Now, the impurity of this text, as intimated by the legend, its "darkness," as it were, is removed in the "White" Yajurveda, which is ascribed to the R'ishi Yajna valkya ; for in the latter we possess a " Sanhitl and a "clear" Bnihman'a.
The topics treated of in both redactions are on the whole the same, but they are differently placed, and vary sometimes in detail. The A s'tramedha or horse sacrifice, which is merely alluded to in a few hymns of the R'igveda-SanhitA, is dwelt upon in the Yajurveda with considerable detail. The fact of six hundred and nine animals of various descriptions, domestic and wild, including birds and reptiles, being tied to twenty-one posts, and the intervals between them, at the performance of this sacrifice, may convey an idea of the complicated ritual which existed at the time when this Veda was composed. Of ceremonies, unknown to the other Vedas, we may mention also, the Purusha-medha or man-sacrifice--an emblematic ceremony, in which a hundred and eighty-five men of various specified tribes, characters, and profeasions, are bound to eleven posts, and consecrated to various deities—the Sarra-medha or all-sacrifice, and the Pitri-nzedha or sacrifice to the manes. It is worthy of notice, too, not only that all the four castes, the institution of which cannot with certainty be traced to the period of the Wigveda-SanhitA, make their distinct appearance in the Yajurveda, but also that it contains many words which in the mythology of the epic poems and the Punin'as are names of S'iva, the third god of the later Hindu triad.
The Taittirlya-SanhitA of the Black Yajurveda is arranged in seven Kibi'd'a or books, with forty-four Prapde hake or chapters, containing altogether six hundred and fifty-one Anurdka or sections, divided into two thousand one hundred and ninety-eight Kale d'ikd or portions. The Vdjasaneyi-Sanhitd of the White Yajurveda, in the Madhyandina recension, Is divided into forty Adhydya or lectures, with three hundred and three Anurdka or sections, comprising one thousand nine hundred and seventy-five Kan'd'ikd or portions. Other schools con nected with either form of this Veda adopted other divisions, which, however, need not be adverted to here.
That the Sanhitd of tho Atharrareda is not a sacrificial collection in the sense of that of the SamA- and Yajur-veda we have explained already. It is divided into twenty Kdn'd'a or books, the first eighteen of which contain thirty-four Prapdt'haka or chapters, which comprise ninety-four A nurdka or sections : the seventeenth 1CAn'd'a consisting of one Prapatrhaka only, which has no further subdivision; the nineteenth Kan'd'a is not divided into PrapAt'hakas, but simply into seven Anu vakas ; and the twentieth contains nine Anuvakas, the third of which has three Parydyas. The AnuvAkas in their turn consist of about six thousand verses. " Its first eighteen books," of which alone it was originally composed, Professor Whitney, the learned editor of the `AtharvasanllitA„' observes (` Journal of the American Oriental Society,' vol. iv. p. 254), "are arranged upon a like system throughout : the
length of the hymns, and not either their subject or their alleged authorship, being the guiding principle ; those of about the same number of verses are combined together into books, and the books made up of the shorter hymns stand first in order. A sixth of the mass, however, is not metrical, but consists of longer or shorter prose pieces, nearly akin in point of language and style to passages of the BrShman'as. Of the remainder, or metrical portion, about one-sixth is also found amongst the hymns of the R'ik, and mostly in the tenth book of the latter ; the rest is peculiar to the Atharva. Respecting their authorship the tradition has no information of value to give; they are with few exceptions attributed to mythical personages.
" As to the internal character of the Atharva hymns, it may be said of them, as of the tenth hook of the R'ik, that they are the pro ductions of another and a later period, and the expressions of a different spirit, from that of the earlier hymns in the other Veda. In the latter, the gods are approached with reverential awe, indeed, but with love and confidence also ; a worship is paid them that exalts the offerer of it ; the demons, embraced under the general name .Rakshas, are objects of horror, whom the gods ward off and destroy ; the divinities of the Atharva are regarded rather with a kind of cringing fear, as powers whose wrath is to be deprecated and whose favour curried for ; it knows a whole host of imps and hobgoblins, in ranks and classes, ruid addresses itself to them directly, offering them homage to induce them to abstain from doing harm. The mantra, prayer, which in the older Veda is the instrument of devotion, is here rather the tool of superstition; it wrings from the unwilling hands of the gods the favours which of old their good-will to men induced them to grant, or by simple magical power obtains the fulfilment of the utteree wishes. Tho most prominent characteristic feature of the Atharva is the multitude of incantations which it contains ; these are pronounced either by the person who is himself to be benefited, or, more often, by the sorcerer for him, and are directed to the procuring of the greatest variety of desirable ends ; most frequently, perhaps, long life, or recovery from grievous sickness, is the object sought ; then a talisman, such as a necklace, is sometimes given, or in very numerous cases some plant endowed with marvellous virtues is to bo the immediate external means of the cure ; farther, the attainment of wealth or power is aimed at, the downfall of enemies, success in love or in play, the removal of petty pests, and so on, even down to the growth of hair on a bald pate. There are hymns, too, in which a single rite or ceremony is taken up and exalted, somewhat in the same strain as the Soma in the Pasamanya hymns of the Rik. Others of a speculative mystical character are not wanting; yet their number is not so great as might naturally be expected, considering the develop ment which the Hindu religion received in the periods following after that of the primitive Veda. It seems in the main that the Atharva is of popular rather than of priestly origin ; that in making the transi tion from the Vedic to modern times, it forms an intermediate step, rather to the gross idolatries and superstitions of the ignorant mass, than to the sublimated pantheism of the Brahmans." (Ib. vol. Hi. p. 307.) The general character of the Brahnian'a, or dogmatic, portion of the Vedas having been explained before, a short notice of the principal works of that class, and a few extracts from them, will illustrate the position they bold between the collection of hymns and the remainder of the Vaidik literature.