A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India v1.c4.78

v1.c4.78

§ 9. I must here express my views on the Hindi language in general, and I do so thus early in the dissertation, as it may be that there will be found to be some novelty in them, and perhaps they will not be readily accepted by those who are interested in supporting the claims of other languages of the class. For I should here mention, for the benefit of European readers, that there exists in India a sort of rivalry between the Aryan languages, or rather between the three principal ones, Hindi, Marathi, and Bengali, each considering itself superior to the others, and my Bengali and Marathi friends will probably not agree with me in giving the palm to Hindi until they read my reasons for so doing, and perhaps not even then.