The medical system of the Hindus is as old as their civilisation, and has lent materials for laying the foundation in other countries. No ancient nation can trace its healing art from prehistoric times, or present such a continuous though not a complete record of development for so many centuries. From the Vedic period, which we can safely put down as 4000 to 2500 B.C., we can trace the rudiments of medicine rising in two or three tiny streams from the slopes of the Himalayas. (a) The early hymns of the Rig Veda make mention of medicinal plants and herbs, and the hygienic properties of water, air and vegetables. (b) The juice of the Soma plant is praised as the amrita (ambrosia), and medicine for a sick man, and gold and lead are spoken of as the elixir of life. (c) Brahma, the chief of the godhead, seeing the suffering of mankind, hands down the Ayur Veda (the science of life) to Surya the sun god, who, like Phœbus, or Apollo of the Greeks, was regarded as the fountain of medical knowledge. The twin sons of Surya (the Ashwins) become the medical attendants of the gods, and attend as surgeons in the wars between the gods and the demons, cure wounds and surgical accidents, and teach Indra (the rain god) the Ayur Veda. These tiny streams were the beginnings of materia medica, chemistry and surgery, and uniting went to form the nucleus of Hindu medicine in course of time. In the next stage of the Vedic period we descend from the cloudland of mythology to the early dawn of Hindu medicine, and find two distinguished pupils of Indra, Dhanvantari and Atreya. Dhanvantari, the divine physician, was the father of Hindu medicine as Esculapius was among the Greeks, and is said to have brought the cup of amrita, the drink of immortality, and taught Susruta the science of surgery. Atreya taught his pupils on the slopes of the Himalayas, and wrote several works, of which Atreya Samhita stands foremost. All his pupils became famous, and each distinguished himself by writing a medical treatise, of whom may be mentioned Agnivesha, who wrote a book on "Ophthalmology," and another on "Nidananjana," a well-known book on the diagnosis of disease; and Harita who compiled "Harita Samhita," a standard treatise on medicine containing among other things a description of the blood and its circulation.

Ayur Veda is the most ancient system of Hindu medicine and can now only be seen in fragments. Sir William Jones, writing about it, says:

I have myself met with fragments of that primeval work, and in the Veda itself I found, with astonishment, an entire Upanishad on the internal parts of the body with an examination of the nerves and arteries, a description of the heart, spleen, and liver, and various disquisitions on the formation and growth of the fœtus.

Atreya Samhita is the oldest existing work on Hindu medicine, written by Atreya for the use of his pupils and containing 46,500 verses in all.

About the close of the Vedic period the Hindus attained a high degree of civilisation, and cultivated medicine, surgery, materia medica, and chemistry. The surgeons accompanied kings to the battlefield, where they used surgical instruments, extracted foreign bodies, and dressed the wounds and applied bandages. The healing art was no longer confined to Brahmin priests, but a class of laymen called Vaidyas came into existence, who specialized in medicine or surgery. Humoral pathology must have been known to the Hindus as early as this, as we find the three humours of the body mentioned in the Rig Veda (1,34,6).

The Epic Period (2500 to 1400 B.C.).-During the early part of this period the Hindu civilisation continued to shine in all its splendour and glory. It was the time depicted in the two great epic poems, the Ramayana and the Mahabarata. There was a physician attached to every court whose duty it was to look after the health of the king. The surgeons undertook major operations, both on the battlefied and in private practice. Schools of philosophy were opened where students were taught medicine and surgery. Dissection and vivisection on dead animals were practised; and chemistry was brought into practical use by the development of chemical arts, such as bleaching, dyeing, calico printing, tanning, soap and glass-making, etc. The Hindu medicine flourished in all its branches. New drugs were added to the pharmacopoeia by physicians who went out with their pupils to gather herbs and study their properties. Classical authors, such as Charaka, Susruta, make their appearance, whose works became the groundwork of succeeding Hindu writers for many centuries.

Pre-Buddhist Period (1400 to 500 B.C.).—This was the age of Hindu sutras and philosophic systems which later on attracted the illustrious men of Greece, such as Pythagoras, who visited the Surmans of India, and took back with them Hindu philosophy and medicine, which they embodied in their schools and writings.

Buddhist Period (500 B.C. to 600 A.D.)—Buddha, by prohibiting animal sacrifices and the dissection of dead animals, gave a death-below to surgery but medicine flourished. After Buddha's death, the pilgrims who came from all parts to visit the land of his birth returned with manuscripts of Hindu literature and medicine and translated them into their own tongues. While in India itself Indian medicine received the greatest support from King Asoka-the Indian Constantine-and his followers. Medical houses or hospitals were established for both men and animals in the north and western parts of India, and were provided with all sorts of instruments and medicines, consisting of mineral and vegetable drugs. Buddhist monks in different monasteries studied philosophy and medicine and fortified their spiritual ministry by becoming skilful physicians and relieving the suffering of the people.

When Alexander invaded India he found on all sides signs of advanced civilization. And Taxilles tried to conciliate the General by promising to send" a goblet of ruby and a philosopher of great knowledge and a physician who has such skill that he can restore the dead." Arrian tells us that Alexander brought with him many clever Greek physicians who were unable to cure snakebites and other ailments, while the Indian physicians treated these cases with success. The Greek General was so struck with the skill of these Vaidyans (physicians) that he employed them in his camps and ordered his followers to consult them. Tradition says that at the end of his Indian campaign he took some of these learned Vaidyans to Greece with him. These facts throw a sidelight on the state of Indian medicine, which must have been successfully carried on for centuries before it could have attained the advanced condition in which Alexander found it on his arrival in India in the fourth century B.C.

Arabian Period (600 to 1000 A.D.).—The Hindu medical works were greatly prized by the Arabians, whose intellectual activity was awakened after the death of Mahomed. Charaka, Susruta, and other Sanskrit literature were translated under the patronage of the Caliphs, who made their Court brilliant by gathering round them eminent men and philosophers of all nationalities, including Jews, Christains and Indians, and established a school at Bagdad, which attained a world-wide fame and influence. In the eighth century, and probably the ninth, Indians practised as physicians

in Bagdad, and during the reign of Harun-alRashid they also lived at his Court. Manka was a body physician to the Caliph, cured him of a dangerous illness, and translated a work on poisons, by Charaka, into Persian.

The Arabian physicians who followed in the ninth and tenth centuries prescribed Indian drugs, and in their medical treatises made use of the Hindu authors and their works. For instance, Avicenna, in describing the treatment by leeches, begins by saying: "What the Indian says," and quotes the very words of Susruta in his description of six poisonous leeches. And what the Arabians learnt from the Hindu medical and scientific works they transmitted to the European physicians as late as the seventeenth century A.D.

The Mahomedan Period (1000 to 1500 A.D.).The rise of the power of the Mahomedans at the heel of the Arabians marks the epoch of the sunset of Indian medicine, although even at the Mahomedan courts the Vaidyans are reported to have cured many intractable diseases which had baffled the skill of their foreign rivals. While at the European period the Hindu medicine received its final death-blow.

DIFFERENT BRANCHES OF HINDU MEDICINE. Now let us take a glance at the different branches of Hindu medicine.

Hygiene.-The Hindus paid great attention to hygiene, regimen of the body, and diet. The Hindu Shastras contain also a sanitary code: and, Manu, the great law-giver, was one of the greatest sanitary reformers the world has ever seen. The daily practice of early rising, of cleansing the teeth, anointing the body, bathing, exercise, shampooing, and rubbing the body, became part of their religious duties. Two meals a day and food taken sparingly, so as to rise from meals with the stomach partly empty, rinsing the mouth before and after meals, chewing of pan which contains aromatics and spices to stimulate gastric juice and remove fætor from the mouth, were part of their daily system containing sound physiology. They understood the sanitary properties of oil, which was used not only for the purposes of consecration but also for guests and strangers, and also for health and cleanliness. They have a saying that: "As serpents never go near an eagle, so diseases do not approach a person who is in the habit of taking physical exercise and anointing his limbs with oil." Shampooing (massage) was practised from time immemorial by the Hindus. It is said to accelerate the mind, cure diseased phlegm,

wind and fat; to diminish fatigue, increase internal heat, and bring on sleep. Both shampooing and anointing, used also by other ancient nations, such as Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, &c., were no doubt copied from the Hindus. Drinking and eating from the vessels of others, wearing shoes, clothes, or garlands used by others were considered a pollution, showing they had an idea of contamination so early in their period of history.

Chemistry.-In the Vedic period chemistry began as Rasayana, which was confined to fluid extracts and vegetable decoctions, and became merged into alchemy when the vegetable drugs were supplanted by mercury and metallic preparations. Though the Tantric cult and the worship of Siva (the third person of the Hindu Trinity) brought alchemy into prominence by identifying mercury with the elixir of life and philosopher's stone, chemistry made a gradual progress from the time of Charaka and Susruta. The ancient Hindus knew how to prepare sulphuric acid, nitric acid, and muriatic acid; the oxides of copper, iron, lead (of which they had both the red oxide and litharge), tin and zinc; the sulphuret of iron, copper, mercury, antimony and arsenic; sluphate of copper, zine and iron, and carbonate of lead and iron. The fact that Susruta gives a description of making caustic alkali from the ashes of plants, the originality of which very much struck M. Barthelot, is a proof of the high degree of perfection the Hindu achieved in scientific pharmacy at so early an age. The preparation of ammonia, of alkalies and their salts, nitric hydrochloric and sulphuric acids, though rudely simple, is of great antiquity- They understood the chemical processes of calcination, sublimation, distillation, and simple as was their apparatus, they distilled two of the most fragrant essences, the attar of rose and fragrant grass oil of Namur. The great metallurgist Patanjali (second century B.C.), in his treatise on "Meatallurgy," gives elaborate directions for the preparation of metallic salts, alloys, amalgams, and the extraction, purification and assaying of metals. Probably it was he who discovered the use of mixtures called Vidas, which contained aqua regia or other mineral acids in potentia. Though Charaka and Susruta mention mercury in their writings, Vagbhata mentions the use of mercury as a collyrium. Varahamihira (587 A.D.) gives mercury and iron among the aphrodisiacs and tonics. The metallurgist Nagarjuma (eighth century A.D.) advanced the knowledge of chemical compounds by his preparations

of mercury. He was the first to introduce black sulphide of mercury. In the time of Vrinda (ninth century A.D.) and Chakrapani (tenth and eleventh centuries A.D.) the administration of mercury and its preparations was fully established, thus anticipating Paracelsus and his followers by several centuries. There can be no question as regards the priority of the Hindus in making mercury and its preparations a specialty, and administering them both externally and internally. In fact, among the ancients they were the only people who prescribed mercury internally, and the first to give mercury internally in syphilis. In the sixteenth century, when the Portuguese settled themselves in Goa and other parts of India, syphilis made its appearance. The Hindu physicians could not account for this disease, as all their medical writings from the time of Charaka and Susruta downwards were silent on the subject, while they gave accurate descriptions of other diseases of the genital organs. So they called it Phiranga Roga (Portuguese disease), and administered mercury in the form of calomel and by inunction. The term "Phiranga Roga " speaks volumes as to the origin of syphilis in India.

As for applied chemistry, Megasthenes says that Indians were early skilled in the arts Among the chemical arts and manufactures which enabled India to command for more than on thousand years the markets of the East as wel as of the West, there were three of the grea India discoveries which secured to India an easy and universally recognised pre-eminence amon the European nations of the world: (a) Th preparation of fast dyes for textile fabrics; (b) th extraction of indigotin from the indigo plant; (c the tempering of steel.

The art of dyeing was carried almost to per fection, the fast colours resembling the Tyria purple. The blades of Damascus, so famous i Persia and Arabia and all through the Middl Ages, were made of Indian steel and manufactur ed in the workshops of Western India. Th wrought iron pillar close to the Kutub, nea Delhi, weighing 10 tons, and being 1,500 year old, the huge iron girders at Puri, the ornament al gates of Somnath, bear eloquent testimon to the marvellous metallurgical skill attained b the Hindus. Bleaching, dyeing, calico printing tanning, soap and brass making, were some of th chemical arts known to the Hindus from hig antiquity. They early attained perfection in co per and brass work, in gold and silver ornamen

admired for delicacy and beauty, and in the weaving of cotton and muslin unrivalled for their softness of texture and exquisite fineness. Firearms of some kind were used in the early stage of Indian history: rockets (says Professor Wilson) appear to be of Indian invention. Varahamihira gives several preparations of cements, "strong as a thunderbolt," used in the temple architecture of the Buddhist period. The Vasavadatta and the Dasukumara Charita, in sixth century A.D., allude to the preparation of coagulated mercury; a chemical powder to bring deep sleep, a chemically prepared stick for producing light without fire, and a powder like curare which paralyses the sensory and motor organs.

Pathology. According to the Hindus the body is composed of five elements-wind, fire, water, earth and ether-having their respective qualities of dryness, sharpness, fluidity, heaviness and lightness. The humours of the body-wind, bile, and phlegm-are formed from the elements. The harmonious action of the elements and their qualities constitute health. The humours prepare the various actions of the body. When the humours become either corrupt or deranged they cause disease or death. So that to reduce the humours where they are abundant, and increase them where they are wanting to get the right proportion of elements in their humours, form the basis of cure among the Indians. This object is accomplished, in the first place, by the management of diet, strict regimen, and temperate life. If these fail, the deranged humours should be expelled by emetics, purgatives and blood-letting. Therefore the Hindu physicians used to prescribe emetics once a fortnight, a purgative once a month, and blood-letting twice a year at the change of seasons. There are certain seasons when the corrupted humours of the body are ripe for being evacuated, and this period of maturation of deranged humours was called the critical stage-the "crisis" of Hippocrates, the idea of which exists even to the present day. So then, the diseases of the body are the diseases of the various humours. Medicine by increasing or decreasing the humours cures the diseases of the body, while the diseases of the mind are cured by reading the Shastras (scriptures), abstinence, leading a religious life, and various mortifications of the body. As the Hindu physicians saw that the blood was more generally affected by deranged humours causing disease, the derangement of blood as the fourth cause came to be added to the humoral theory,

hence their enthusiasm in giving medicines, and local and general blood-letting to purify the blood. The fact that Hindu pathology was adopted by all the ancient nations and proved to be the basis of their medicine for many centuries shows that there must be a great deal of shrewd observation and common-sense underlying the principle. After all, Hindu pathology is not so absurd as it seems on the surface. The wind diseases of the ancients are diseases of the respiratory system, the diseases of bile correspond to the diseases of the circulatory system, while the derangements of phlegm come under the diseases of alimentary system. The humoral pathology, worked out at such an early period as the Rig Veda, shows that the Hindus were the teachers, not the learners from other nations.

The ancient Rishis of India went thoroughly into the diagnosis of a case, and were guided by the patient's appearance, eye, tongue, skin, pulse, voice, urine, and fæces. The examination of the pulse was considered the most important of all, and for this purpose the radial artery at the wrist was chosen. It is most striking to note the similarity of the description of the pulse as found in the ancient Sanskrit treatises and the doctrine of the theory of the pulse as taught by Galen, who had evidently derived his knowledge from the works of the ancient Indian physicians. They treated leprosy successfully; their cures of snake-bites astonished Alexander and the Greek physicians who accompanied him. Their attention to diet, fasting and temperate life cut short many a disease in its infancy. They treated almost every ailment by first prescribing purgatives; and intermittent fevers by arsenic, skin eruptions by arsenic and mercury. Their ideas and treatment of consumption seem very modern. They attibuted the cause of consumption to excessive grief, great fatigue, a diminution of mental and bodily strength, violent exercise, excessive venery, and treated it with animal food, ghee (clarified butter) of goats and sheep, with barley, prepared barley flour and rice with animal broths, a mixture of ghee, honey and pepper, garlic, fumes of turpentine and pine, etc., and recommended the patient to live in the same room with goats. The treatment of many other diseases besides consumption is similar to that of the West.

Anatomy.-The Hindus were the first to practise the dissection of the human body. Both Charaka and Susruta insist that the knowledge of practical anatomy is essential to be a practitioner. The body to be dissected was

first washed, placed in still water in a moving stream for seven days and then taken out and each layer examined before being removed, beginning with the skin. Charaka gives 306 bones and Susruta 300 in the human body (the difference is in the counting of the cartilage with the bones), 500 muscles, of which 400 are in the extremities and the remainder in the trunk and head, 107 articulations, 210 joints, 68 movable and 142 immovable, 8 forms of joints, 900 ligaments, of which 600 are in the extremities, 230 in the trunk and 70 in the neck and head. The Hindus believed that from the navel all the blood-vessels proceed and that it is the principal seat of life (prana). Susruta enumerates 40 principal vessels with 700 branches; 10 contain wind (hence artery means carrier of air), 10 bile, 10 phlegm, and 10 blood. Blood nourishes all the other essential parts of the body.

Digestion and Circulation.-The Hindus held that the food we eat goes down by the action of bi-motor force (prana vayu) into the gullet and stomach, where it becomes mixed up first with gelatinous mucus, which has a saccharine taste, and then acidulated by the further action of digestive juice (evidently gastric juice), and goes down the pitta vayu (duodenum), into which bile comes down from the liver, and then into the small intestine. There the bile acts on the chyme and converts it into chyle. The essence of chyle from the small intestine is driven by the bi-motor force (prana vayu) along with the dhamni trunk (the thoracic duct) first to the heart and then to the liver, where the colouring matter in the bile acts on the essence of chyle and imparts to it a red pigment, transforming it into blood. The circulation of the blood is distinctly understood by Charaka, Susruta, Dalvana, Bhanumati, etc., as we read that the heart which receives and then sends down the chyle through the dhamanies and gets it back transformed into blood." To them the circulation of chyle was really identical with the circulation of the blood, as they argued that chyle, or rasa is blood without the colouring ingredient. Harita, who is older than Susruta, in describing anæmia as caused by swallowing clay, says: "The clay thus eaten blocks the lumen of the several veins and stops the circulation of the blood." Bhavamisra, who was centuries older than Harvey, quotes another author thus: "Blood by circulaing through its vessels fills the dhatus well, causes perception, and performs other functions (of nourishing and strengthening)."

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Surgery forms the first chapter in the Ayur Veda, and Susruta says that" it (surgery) was the first and best of the medical sciences; less liable than any others to the fallacy and conjectural and inferential practice pure in itself, perpetual in its applicability, the worthy place of heaven, and certain source of fame." The ancient Hindu practitioners were bold and expert surgeons and performed cystotomy, lithotomy, embryotomy, and couched for cataract. There were three modes adopted by the Hindus for treating surgical cases -by cutting instruments, by caustics, and by actual cautery. In the opinion of Susruta caustic is better than the knife and the cautery better than either. The earliest surgical works mention fewer than 125 surgical instruments for ophthalmic, obstetric and other operations, which shows how carefully they studied surgery. They set fractures and dislocations in men and beasts, reduced hernia, cured piles and fistula-in-ano, and extracted foreign bodies. They performed amputations and abdominal section. They were experts in rhinoplastic operations, which were practised for ages in India. As Dr. Hirschberg says: "The whole plastic surgery in Europe had taken its new flight when these cunning devices of Indian workmen became known to u8. The trans

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gave practical instruction on surgery to their pupils. The different surgical operations were shown to the students upon wax spread out upon a board, on gourds, cucumbers, and other soft fruits; tapping and puncturing was practised on a leather bag of water or of soft mud; scarification on the fresh hides of animals on which the hair was allowed to remain; venesection on the vessels of dead animals and on the stalks of water lilies; the art of probing and stuffing on bamboo, reed, and cavities of wood; suturing on pieces of cloth, skin or hide; ligatures and bandages on wellmade models of human limbs; application of caustics and the actual cautery on pieces of flesh; catheterization on an unbaked earthern vessel filled with water; and the extraction of teeth upon dead bodies of animals. When operation was decided on, an auspicious day was selected, and a clean and well-lighted room was chosen, instruments arranged so as to be at hand when required. with bandages, lint, honey, ghee, hot and cold water, etc. The patient faced the east, the sur geon the west. Incense was kept burning in the operation room, thus foreshadowing the germ theory of the present day. In serious or painful operation