A Manipuri Grammar, Vocabulary, And Phrase Book

The author reveals that this little book will, he hopes, supply a want which has been much felt ever since our annexation of Upper Burma. The only land route to Upper Burma from Assam and Bengal is through Manipur, The journey through Manipur occupies about a fortnight. Hardly any Manipuri knows any language but his own, so officers travelling through find great difficulty in getting at the different stage the supplies which they are in want of owing to their inability to make themselves under stood by the Manipuri officials. Manipur is now the headquarters of an Assam regiment, and in all probability it will remain for some time to come a Military Station, owing to the healthiness of its climate, as well as to its admirable strategically position in the event of any outbreak on the frontier. The above reasons have made a knowledge of Manipuri of greater importance than in former years. With the object of assisting in the study of Manipuri, he has prepared a grammar, vocabulary, and phrase book of the language. In the vocabulary section, he has arranged the nouns under different headings, such as relationship, trades etc., which is he thinks a simpler plan than jumbling up in alphabetical order a number of words having no connection with each other. The English phrases he has copied from Cutter’s Assamese Phrase Book. He has added at the end of the book a few Manipuri proverbs and also a few specimens of letters in Manipuri in order to give an idea of the style of address adopted in such compositions.