The two works called Charaka Sanhita and Susruta Ayurveda are the oldest and most celebrated treatises on Hindu medicine now extant. An older work called A'yurveda is mentioned in both these works as having formed a part of the Atharva Veda. It is said to have been originally composed by Brahma, the creator, and to have consisted of a thousand chapters and a hundred-thousand slokas. Afterwards, in consideration of the short lives and small intellects of human beings, it was abridged into eight chapters as follows: -

1. Salya or surgical treatment.

2. Sάlakya or diseases of the head, eyes, ears and face.

3. Kayachikitsά or treatment of general diseases.

4. Bhutavidyά or diseases caused by evil spirits.

5. Kaumάra-bhritya or the treatment of infants and of the puerperal state.

6. Agada or antidotes to poisons.

7. Rasάyana or medicines which promote health and longevity.

8. Vάjikarana, or aphrodisiacs.

The A'yurveda with a hundred thousand slokas is probably a myth, but the abridged A'yurveda with its eight divisions seem to have had a real existence, although it is not available in the present day. It probably became obsolete after the works of Charaka and Susruta were composed.

Charaka is generally believed to be older than Susruta and consequently to be the oldest work on Sanskrit Medicine now extant. In the introduction to this work it is said that A'treya, a learned devotee, taught the holy A'yurveda to six pupils; namely, Agnivesa, Bhela, Jatukarna, Parasara, Harita and Kharapani. Agnivesa first wrote a treatise on medicine, and afterwards Bhela and others followed, each producing a separate work and thereby acquiring great renown. The work of Agnivesa was regarded as the best. It was edited or corrected by Charaka in whose name it is now current. At the end of each book.

of this work it is said, that this tantra or scientific treatise was composed by Agnivesa and corrected by Charaka. A later writer Vagbhatta in his introduction to his Ashtάnga-hridaya- sanhitά says, that that work had been compiled from the treatises of Agnivesa, Hάrita, Bhela, Sάsvata, Susruta, Kavala, and others. From this it would seem that the six disciples of A'treya, mentioned in Charaka, were not mythical beings, but authors of books, for two of them, namely, Agnivesa and Bhela are mentioned by Vagbhatta. It would appear also that at the time Vag-bhatta lived, Agnivesa's work was not called by the name of Charaka, and Susruta had also been written. Hence it follows that Charaka's edition of Agnivesa, that is the work now called Charaka, was probably edited after Susruta had been written. A'treya is said to have lectured somewhere near the Himalaya, and his name occurs very frequently in the Vedas. His father Atri was a renowned sage, and the author of a law treatise which is current in his name. There is no clue to the nativity of Charaka, but Dridhabala, who added some chapters to his work, calls himself a native of Panchanada or the Panjab.* Susruta, on the other hand, is said to have been written in Benares. From the facts detailed above it is clear that the work called Charaka was composed at a very early age. I will not attempt to hit at the century before Christ in which it was probably written as it is a question which can be best discussed by professed antiquarians. I may notice, however, that the book is composed in an antiquated style and appears to have been written before the spread of the Puranic form of Hinduism, as the names of modern gods and goddesses do not occur in it, and the author does not, at the commencement of the work, offer his salutations to any mythological deity, as is usual with later writers. Beef was not then, apparently, a forbidden food, for Charaka speaks of it as an article of diet that should not be taken daily.+

The work next in point of age, namely, Susruta, is mora systematic in its arrangement, contains better details of anatomy and pathology, and shews on the whole a more advanced state of knowledge, both of general principles and of details of treatment. The origin of the Susruta A'yurveda is thus described in the introduction to that work. Dhanvantari, the surgeon of heaven, descended upon earth in the person of Diva dasa, king of Benares, for the purpose of teaching surgery along with the other branches of medical knowledge by which the gods preserve themselves from decline, disease and death. Susruta and other pupils besought him for instruction in surgical knowledge. Dhanvantari asked them what they wished to learn. The pupils replied "you will be pleased to make surgical knowledge the basis of your instruction, and to address your lectures to Susruta, who will take notes." Dhanvantari replied, "be it so. For surgery is the first and most important part of the A'yurveda, inasmuch as the healing of wounds was the first necessity for the medical art among the gods on account of their battles with the demons. Besides surgical treatment effects rapid cures, has recourse to instruments, mechanical appliances,caustics and the actual cautery and is intimately connected with the other branches of medical science." Accordingly we find that Susruta devotes the greater portion of his work to such subjects as anatomy, surgical instruments and operations, inflammation and surgical diseases, care of the king and his troops in the battle-field, obstetrical operations, poisons, etc.

The general diseases such as fever, diarrhoea, chest diseases, etc., are treated of in the last book called "Uttara--tantra," but there are reasons for believing, that this portion did not originally form a part of the work, but was subsequently added by some writer with the object of giving completeness to it. This is evident from several reasons. The very name Uttara "supplemental" is enough to suggest the idea of its being an after thought, if not a subsequent work. Had it been an integral part of the original | treatise, it would have been included in the original scheme. But at the end of the first chapter of the first book an analysis of the contents of the entire work is given wherein it is said that this work consists of five parts containing 120 chapters in all.* This is followed by a line to the effect that in the Uttara-tantra the remainder of the subject will be described. This last line, however, is evidently an interpolation, for if the original writer of the work had divided his book into six parts, he would not have said that it consisted of five parts. Besides the Uttara-tantra has a separate introduction in which the writer says it is compiled from the works of learned sages on the six divisions of Kάyachikitsά or the treatment of general diseases, and from the work of Videhidhipa on Sάlakya Sastra or diseases of the head, eyes, ears and nose.