A Malayalam Dictionary

With the growth of vernacular learning on the Malabar Coast, it cannot but happen that an increasing number of persons, who are unable to consult a Malayalam-English Dictionary, are feeling the want of one, in which the meanings of words may be found in their native tongue. To meet this want the compiler of the following Dictionary undertook the task, which has proved a more lengthy and laborious one than at first anticipated, several years since; and he trusts that, whatever the imperfections of the work –and no one can be more conscious of those imperfections than himself—it may, at least in some degree, answer the end in view. Little need be said, by way of preface, upon a book, the nature and object of which are so self-evident, beyond a few observations on matters that may be peculiar to the book itself. And he trusts that whatever the imperfections of the present attempt, it may encourage native students in the study of their own tongue, and may add its mite in helping to produce among the sons of Malayala closer students, and better lexicographers and grammarians, that those that have gone before.