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Table of Contents | |
Section | Page |
Start of eBook | 1 |
FOOTNOTES: | 1 |
FOOTNOTES: | 24 |
TALES OF IND, | 24 |
LIFE IN AN INDIAN VILLAGE. | 26 |
[Footnote 1: Ranipett.]
THE STORY OF RUDRA.
A deep calm sea; on the blue waters toiled,
From morn till eve, the simple fishermen;
And, on the beach, there stood a group
of huts
Before whose gates old men sat mending
nets
And eyed with secret joy the little boys
That gaily gambolled on the sandy beach
Regardless of their parents’ daily
toils.
And all the busy women left their homes
And their young ones with baskets on their
heads
Filled with the finny treasures of the
deep.
A thousand yards to landward rose a town
With its broad streets, high roofs, and
busy marts.
An ancient temple in the centre stood,
Where to his servant Nandi once appeared
Great Siva, it is said, in human frame.
E’en learned saints sang of the
holy shrine;
And to this sacred spot from far-off lands
For adoration countless pilgrims came
And men to buy all rarest things that
poured
Into her busy marts from foreign parts.
Here in this ancient port of Nundipore
In royal splendour lived a merchant youth,
Who scarce had reached his one-and-twentieth
year.
His aged father had but lately died
And left him the sole heir of all his
wealth.
And Rudra—for that was the
brave youth’s name—
Had heard from infant days full many tales
Of how his grandsire and his sire had
braved
The perils of the deep in search of gold,
And in his bosom fondly nurtured hopes
To travel likewise on the dang’rous
sea.
And oft would he to Rati, his fair wife,
Exulting tell how wisely he would trade
In foreign shores and with rare gems return;
How even princes, by those gems allured,
To court his friendship come from distant
lands,
And he dictate his own high terms to them,
And thus add glory to his glorious house.
And often would she vainly plead in turn
Her desolate position and her youth.
And her dear lord implore upon her knees
For ever to dismiss his cherished thoughts
And turn to her and to their lordly wealth
Which God had given them, to live in peace.
Thus wrangled for some months the timid
wife
And he whom woman’s charms could
not subdue
Until at last arrived th’ appointed
day.
The little ship was waiting in the port,
And Rudra to his youthful wife repaired
His purpose to disclose; and as at times
Clouds hover over us and darken all
The sky for days, and still no rain descends—
But suddenly when least expected comes—
So she to whom her husband’s parting
lay
In words saw it burst in reality.
He said, “Dear Rati! well thou knowest
how
I fondly wish to trade in distant realms.
The time has come for me to part from
thee.
This morn a little ship was sighted here,
And she is riding yonder on the sea.
And ere the setting sun sinks down to
rest
Into the western waves the little bark
Now destined to take me will leave the
port;
And I have therefore one, but one short
hour.
’Tis willed by Him above that I
should soon
Bid farewell to the place where I was
born,
Where all my thoughts for ever centred
lie,—
Soon part from all that to my heart is
dear,
But soon come richer, greater to my home,
To spend my days in joy and happiness.
Dear wife! allow me therefore to depart.”
To which the wife—“Dear
husband, sad it is
To me to think that thou shouldst part
from me;
But sadder still the thought that thou
shouldst go
On seas to roam in lands unknown and strange,
And canst not tell when to this spot return.
There is our lordly mansion here; there
is
Our wealth, and here I am thy youthful
wife.
Why go away and risk thy precious life
While we enjoy our days like king and
queen?
Why leave me here to pine away in grief
And loneliness? Without my lord it
is
Half death to me, and I would rather die
Than see him part; hence banish from thy
mind
All thoughts of going and stay here with
me.”
“My wife!” he said, “why
cherish idle fears?
The holy Brahmin whom thou knowest well,
So deeply versed in all the starry lore,
Tells me that I am fated to return.
It is an evil omen that thou shouldst,
Lamenting, hinder me at this last hour
And tell me not to go. Send me away
With thy good wishes, I will soon return.
By Him above that rules man’s destinies,
By mother earth, by yonder setting sun,
The moon that shines up in the starry
heav’ns,
By all that to his heart is sacred deemed,
And lastly by his sire whose picture hangs
On the wall there, thy husband Rudra swears
That after he returns he’ll stay
with thee,
And nevermore e’en think of leaving
thee,
And let him therefore go in peace of mind.”
“If it is true,” replied the
crying maid,
“That Sita followed Rama to the
woods,
And that she of the Pandus also shared
With them their toils—if ever
woman’s charms
Had power to move the adamantine heart
Of man, then let thy Rati go with thee
To share with thee thy joys and woes as
well.
If thou shouldst go alone, remember then,
Dear lord, the sin rests solely on thy
head
That a young maiden has been left alone
To mourn for ever for her husband on
The seas—and all for gold and
for a name.”
“A name thou sayest—never,
never would
Thy Rudra die unhonoured and unknown
And bear the evil name and the reproach
For ever with his sons and his sons’
sons,
That of his old illustrious family
He was the only one that feared to go
Upon the sea. The sun is going down,
And cruel darkness is invading fast
On us; and soon the ship will leave the
port.
Within a year thou shalt see me again.
But if ’tis ruled by God that I
should not
Return, to one thing listen ere I go.
To soothe thy spirits in a few short months
An infant will be lying on thy lap,
And if a daughter she should be, let her
Be married to one worthy of our race.
But if a son is born tend him with care;
When he grows old, let it be said of him
That he is his lost father’s worthy
son.”
And when the few last awful words were
spoke
The frighted wife that stood supported
by
Her lord at once grew pale and motionless.
As one that watched with anxious care
the growth
Of a young tendril slowly fixes it
Upon a new and stronger prop, e’en
so
Brave Rudra extricated himself from
Her grasp and gently placed her on the
couch;
Then gazed on her for a few moments with
His hands upon her throbbing temples,
kissed
Her brow, and straightway vanished from
the room.
And now the little ship in which he sailed
Safe bore the crew along the wat’ry
waste,
And after twenty days’ fast sailing
she
Encountered on the way a storm, was wrecked,
And all save Rudra perished in the waves.
The shipwrecked merchant lost all that
he had,
And wandered through a distant country
with
No friends, no money but his hands to
earn
For him his daily bread: the lonely
youth
Thus dragged for years his miserable life
With nothing to make it worth living save
The hope, the only hope, to see his wife;
Till at the end of twenty years a ship
Was sighted that was bound for Nundipore.
In it he sailed and safely landed in
His native port. It was the midday
noon;
He saw the selfsame fishing village that
Stood years ago upon the sandy beach,
And with a joyful heart he hastened to
His house which all deserted seemed; inside
With falt’ring steps he went, and
on the walls
Of the big hall were hanging pictures
of
His sire, of Krishna playing on the flute,
Of Rama, Siva, and the other gods
Whom in his childhood days his house adored,
And seemed as they were drawn but yesterday;
A thousand other old familiar scenes
In quick succession passed before his
eyes,
Then quickly passed into a room, where
lo!
There slept a youth and she for whom for
years
Life’s toils he patient bore.
As one born blind
Had after years of pray’r the gift
of sight
Vouchsafed to him by God, his Maker, to
THE STORY OF THE ROYAL HUNTRESS.
It was a land of plenty and of wealth;
There God’s indulgent hand made
for a race
Supremely blest a paradise on earth.
A land of virtue, truth, and charity,
Where nature’s choicest treasures
man enjoyed
With little toil, where youth respected
age,
Where each his neighbour’s wife
his sister deemed,
Where side by side the tiger and the lamb
The water drank, and sported oft in mirth.
A land where each man deemed him highly
blest
When he relieved the miseries of the poor,
When to his roof the wearied traveller
came
To share his proffered bounty with good
cheer.
Such was the far-famed land of Panchala.
Here reigned a king who walked in virtue’s
path,
Who ruled his country only for his God.
His people’s good he deemed his
only care,
Their sorrows were his sorrows, and their
joys
He counted as his own; such was the king
Whose daily prayers went up to Him on
high
For wisdom and for strength to rule his
men
Aright, and guard the land from foreign
foes.
Such was the far-famed king of Panchala.
An only son he had—a noble
prince,
The terror of his foes, the poor man’s
friend.
He mastered all the arts of peace and
war,
And was a worthy father’s worthy
son.
What gifts and graces men as beauties
deem
These Nature freely lavished on the youth,
And people loved in wonder to behold
The face that kindled pleasure in their
minds.
The courage of a warrior in the field,
A woman’s tender pity to the weak—
All these were centred in the royal youth.
His arrows killed full many a beast that
wrought
Dread havoc on the cattle of the poor.
Such was the famous prince of Panchala.
The people, they were all true men and
good,
Their ruler they adored, for by their
God
He was ordained to rule their native land.
They freely to their king made known their
wants,
And he as freely satisfied their needs,
And e’en the meanest of the land
deemed it
The basest act to sin against his king.
Such were the people of the ancient land
Of Panchala, who stood one day with tears
Before their king to pour their plaintive
tales
Of ruin wrought upon their cattle by
The tiger of the forest, that all day
Was safe in his impenetrable lair,
But every night his dreaded figure showed
And feasted on the flesh of toiling beasts.
The king gave ear to their sad tales of
woe,
And straightway called his only son, and
said—
“Dear son! my people’s good
I value more
Than thine own life. Go therefore
to the woods
With all thine arrows and thy trusty bow,
And drag the dreaded tiger from his den,
And to their homes their wonted peace
restore.
His spotted skin and murderous claws must
soon
Be added to the trophies of the past,
Now hanging on our ancient palace walls.”
The prince obeyed, and to the forest went:
Three days and nights he wandered in the
woods,
But still found not the object of his
search.
He missed his faithful men and lost his
way,
Till worn and weary underneath a tree,
Whose shady boughs extended far and wide,
The lonely straggler stretched his limbs
and slept,
And for a time forgot his dire distress.
He woke, and thus addressed himself with
tears:
“Here I am left deserted and alone,
Perchance my faithful people at this hour
Are vainly searching for their hapless
prince,
While I die here of hunger and of thirst.
And gladly would I welcome now the brute
That has attracted me to this strange
spot,
To plunge his claws into my body, tear
My flesh, and break my bones, and feast
on me
By gnawing them between his horrid jaws,
And so spare me from this slow lingering
death.”
So thought the royal youth of his sad
doom,
When lo! a spotless figure, with a bow,
A pouch with arrows dangling on her back,
A hatchet in her hand for cutting wood,
And with a pitcher on her head, appeared.
Here every day she came to gather wood,
And, dressed in male attire, her heavy
load
Took to the nearest town, sold it, then
reached,
At close of day to cook the ev’ning
meal,
Her cottage on the outskirts of the wood,
Where, with her sire, bent down with years,
she lived,
And dragged her daily miserable life.
Such was the maid that was upon that day,
As if by instinct, drawn to the fair youth,
And such the huntress Radha he beheld.
A fairer woman never breathed the air—
No, not in all the land of Panchala.
The maid in pity saw his wretched plight,
Then from the pitcher took her midday
meal,
And soon relieved his hunger and his thirst.
The grateful prince, delighted, told his
tale,
And she, well pleased, thus spake:
“Fair youth! grieve not,
Behold the brook that yonder steals along,
To this the tiger comes at noon to quench
His thirst. Then, safely perched
upon a tree,
We can for ever check his deadly course,”
Both went, and saw at the expected hour
The monarch of the forest near the brook.
In quick succession, lightning-like from
them
The arrows flew, and in a moment fell
His massive body lifeless on the ground.
Then vowing oft to meet his valiant friend,
The prince returned, and with the happy
news
Appeared before the king, who blest his
son
And said: “My son! well hast
thou done the deed;
Thy life thou hast endangered for my men;
Ask anything and I will give it thee.”
“I want not wealth nor power,”
the prince replied,
“But, noble father I one request
I make.
I chanced to meet a huntress in the wood,
And Radha is her name; she saved my life.
I but for her had died a lingering death,
Her valour and her beauty I admire,
And therefore grant me leave to marry
her.”
The king spake not, but forthwith gave
command
To banish from his home the reckless youth,
Who brought disgrace upon his royal house,
And who, he wished, should wed one worthy
of
The noble race of ancient Panchala.
Poor youth! he left his country and his
home,
He that was dreaded by his foes was gone.
Vain lust of power impelled the neighbouring
king,
The traitor who usurped his sovereign’s
throne,
To march on Panchala with all his men.
He went, and to the helpless king proclaimed—
“Thou knowest well my armies are
the best
On earth, and folly it will be in thee
To stand ’gainst them and shed thy
people’s blood.
Send forth thy greatest archer, and with
him
My prowess I will try: this will
decide
And ere the treacherous wretch could string
his bow,
A pointed arrow carrying death with it,
Like lightning flew from forth the maiden’s
hands,
Pierced deep into his head, that plans
devised
To kill his royal master and once more
Thought ill of Panchala and her good king.
His body lifeless lay upon the field.
Then spake the maiden to the
grateful king:—
“Thou, noble ruler of this ancient
land!
Before thy sacred presence and before
All these assembled in thy royal court,
I will reveal my story, sad but true.
I am the only child of him that ruled
The neighbouring state, whose kings for
centuries
In peace and friendship lived with Panchala.
Alas! the villain, whom my arrow gave
To crows and to the eagles of the air,
Usurped my father’s throne, and
sad to tell,
He instant orders gave to murder us.
The menials sent to do the cruel deed
Felt pity for the fallen king and me,
His only daughter, in the woods left us
And went away, reporting they had done
The deed; and there, in that deserted
place,
Unknown we lived a wretched life for years.
And glad I am that death ignoble, which
The wretch deserved, has now befallen
him.
“This person standing here—I
now remove
The veil, and, by the mole upon his breast,
Behold in him thine own begotten son—
Was by thy orders banished from the land.
Grant that I now may plead for him, because
A woman’s words can sooner soothe
the heart.
I crave your Majesty to pardon him
For loving me, and take him back unto
His father’s home; grant also, gracious
king,
That I, a princess, may be worthy deemed
Of being wedded to thine only son.”
CHANDRA.
A tale of the field of TELLIKOTA, A.D. 1565.
At length the four great Mahometan governments, A’dil Shah, Nizam Shah, Barid, and Kutb Shah, formed a league against Ram Raja, then ruling at Bijayanagar. A great battle took place on the Kishna, near Talicot, which, for the numbers engaged, the fierceness of the conflict, and the importance of the stake, resembled those of the early Mahometan invaders. The barbarous spirit of those days seemed also to be renewed in it; for, on the defeat of the Hindus, their old and brave raja, being taken prisoner, was put to death in cold blood, and his head was kept till lately at Bijapur as a trophy.
This battle destroyed the monarchy of Bijayanagar, which at that time comprehended almost all the South of India. But it added little to the territories of the victors; their mutual jealousies prevented each from much extending his frontier; and the country fell into the hands of petty princes, or of those insurgent officers of the old government, since so well known as zemindars or poligars.
The brother of the late raja removed his residence further east, and finally settled at Chandragiri, about seventy miles north-west of Madras, at which last place his descendant first granted a settlement to the English.—Elphinstone.
The setting sun sank slowly in the west,
The village labourer from the threshing-floor
Hied home full laden with the gathered
corn,
When soon there came, as from a cage just
freed,
Two lovely doves intent to peck the grain
That scattered lay upon the vacant field.
Between these birds, by instinct closely
linked,
Attachment fond had grown. It seemed,
indeed,
That God for speech denied to them had
given
Sense exquisite to know each other’s
ways.
Not all the speech of favoured man in
truth
Could meaning make more clear or deeply
felt
Than one soft motion of the slender frame,
One gentle murmur from the tiny throat.
The wife more bold, yet pausing oft to
scan
Her lord, adventurous strayed with timid
steps,
Unconscious all of aught to mar their
joys.
Just then with steady poise on outstretched
wing
A hungry falcon hovered over her,
Resolved with one fell swoop to seize
his prey,
His talons bury in her tender flesh,
Lift her away to some sequestered spot,
There drink her blood in leisure undisturbed,
And break her bones and her torn flesh
devour.
At early morn upon that selfsame
day
A huntsman sallied forth in search of
food,
And, wandering luckless all day long,
at last
Did chance upon this bird. Behind
a bush
He quickly crept, and straightway strung
his bow.
A gladsome vision suddenly appeared—
He saw his wife and children in their
home
Enjoy the dove’s well spiced and
roasted flesh.
But lo! a gentle flutter of the leaves
By eagerness unconscious caused, to her
Revealed the huntsman take his deadly
aim.
With head uplifted and with wings outstretched
She flight essayed, but saw the falcon
near.
Thus scared and terror-struck she lay
resigned
To fall by deadly arrow pierced, and give
Her lifeless form to feed the hungry bird.
The keen-eyed huntsman saw that lifted
head
And open wings meant flight and sure escape.
He therefore quickly aimed his arrow high,
Which flying pierced the falcon nearing
down.
That selfsame moment when the arrow flew,
When all his thoughts were centred on
the bird,
The huntsman pressed his foot upon a snake
Lo such the story of two human lives!
To them, as happens oft, abundant share
Of Nature’s choicest gifts brought
many ills.
But noble lives are thus more noble made,
As shining gold oft-heated shines the
more.
Over the ancient land of Vijiapore[2]
There reigned a king for truth and valour
known.
The lovely Chandra[3] was his only child,
Who like the moon among the stars of heaven
Shone fairest ’mong the daughters
of the land.
The father fondly hoped his child would
wed
A neighbouring prince, the mighty ruler
of
An ancient kingdom richer than his own;
The mother she would be the worthy spouse
Of him who was her brother’s only
son
And trusted minister of Vijiapore.
But one there was, a courtier of the land,
A youth, yet full of counsel wise and
true,
And ever ready to obey his master’s
will.
The terror of his foes, a hunter bold,
He rode the fleetest horse with ease and
grace,
The wildest elephant his might could tame,
And horned bulls knew well his steady
grip.
Him Chandra wished to wed, and in her
breast
With silent hope her love for him kept
warm.
The years sped on, the father fondly dreamt
She soon would be the queen of two proud
realms,
The mother that her future lord would
be
Both king and minister of state.
Meanwhile
Fair Chandra and her noble Timmaraj
Longed for the consummation of their love.
A flower there is, the fairest
flower in Ind,
A flower beloved by poets of all time,
Whose beauties lovers ever love to tell,
And liken oft to woman’s thousand
charms.
This flower, the stately lotus of our
Ind,
Its petals closes to the moon at eve,
And all its beauties hides through silent
night,
But with the rising of the morning sun
Opens and swells, its beauty full displays,
And sweetest fragrance breathes when fiercest
beat
The rays. E’en so fair Chandra,
though oft told
She womanhood had long ago attained,
And soon must wed one worthy of her race,
Nought heeded when alternate to her view
Were brought the prowess of the neighbouring
king,
The wisdom of the pilot of the state.
To wean her love from noble
Timmaraj,
He forth was sent against his country’s
foes,
With his small band to fall, and ne’er
return.
But oft as he was sent, as often he
Returned victorious with fresh laurels
gained.
And when the bards before the king and
queen
Recited in the ancient palace hall
[Footnote 2: Vijianagar is here called Vijiapore.]
[Footnote 3: Literally, the moon.]
[Footnote 4: The allusion here is to the ancient custom of Swayamvara (self-choice), which is the election of a husband by a princess or a daughter of a kshatriya at a public assembly of suitors for the purpose.]
[Footnote 5: Chandragiri.]
THE KORATHY’S LULLABY.
The Korathy is the tattooer of the Indian village, who offers her services for a small fee. Hindu females are very fond of having their bodies tattooed. The Korathy first makes a sketch of the figure of a scorpion or a serpent on the part of the body offered to her for tattooing, then takes a number of sharp needles, dips them in some liquid preparation which she has ready, and pricks the flesh most mercilessly. In a few days the whole appears green. This is considered a mark of beauty among the Hindus. While the tattooing takes place the Korathy sings a crude song, so as to make the person undergoing the process forget the pain. The following is as nearly as possible a translation of the song which I myself heard:—
Stay, darling, stay—’tis
only for an hour,
And you will be the fairest of the fair.
Your lotus eyes can soothe the savage
beast,
Your lips are like the newly blossomed
rose,
Your teeth—they shine like
pearls; but what are they
Before the beauties of my handiwork?
Stay, darling, stay—’tis
only for an hour,
And you will be the fairest of the fair.
I’ve left my home, and all day hard
I toil
So to adorn the maidens of the land
That erring husbands may return to them;
Such are the beauties of my handiwork.
Stay, darling, stay—’tis
only for an hour,
And you will be the fairest of the fair;
In days of old fair Seeta laid her head
Upon the lap of one of our own clan,
When with her lord she wandered in the
wilds,
And like the emerald shone her beauteous
arms.
Stay, darling, stay—’tis
only for an hour,
And you will be the fairest of the fair.
And often in the wilds, so it is said,
She also of the Pandus went in quest
Of one of us, but found not even one,
And sighed she was not like her sisters
blest.
Stay, darling, stay—’tis
only for an hour,
And you will be the fairest of the fair.
My work is done; rejoice, for you will
be
The fairest of your sisters in the land.
Rejoice for evermore, among them you
Will shine as doth the moon among the
stars.
BY T. RAMAKRISHNA, B.A.
With an Introduction by the Hon. the Rev. W. MILLER, M.A., LL.D., C.I.E., and dedicated, by permission, to the late Lord Tennyson, Poet Laureate.
* * * * *
OPINIONS.
They are interesting and remarkable.—Lord Tennyson.
It is a great pleasure to me to find that a native of South India has so distinguished himself.—The Right Hon. Sir M.E. Grant Duff, G.C.S.I.
It is not often that natives succeed so well as you have done in English versification.—H.H. Kerala Varma, C.S.I.
Krishnapore irresistibly reminds us of Auburn, the fortunes of Seeta are in many respects not unlike those of Evangeline, and some forms of expression seem to be coined in the mint of Tennyson.... These tales possess peculiar interest as first-fruits in poetic literature of that amalgamation of Eastern and Western thought that is going on before us at the present day in this country. They are tales of India, descriptive of Indian scenery, and marked by many traits both of custom and of feeling that are characteristic of India.... These tales—tales of woman’s constancy and woman’s heroism—are pleasing in themselves; and the language in which they are told is simple, imaginative, and marked by a well-sustained melody. The tales are dedicated to Lord Tennyson by “His Lordship’s ardent admirer in the Far East”; and certainly they move in the atmosphere of the Tennysonian idyll.—Madras Christian College Magazine.
Much of the versification is very pleasing, and where it is best, it has a decided ring of Tennyson in it.... The author possesses true poetical genius.—Calcutta Statesman and Friend of India.
SEETA AND RAMA:—The story is pretty, though simple. In parts, moreover, the author, who is anonymous, displays the true spirit of poetry, which he (or she) will do well to cultivate.... The tributes of respect for the heroism, purity, and constancy of women which are found in Mr. Ramakrishna’s poems are in accordance with the teaching of the Mahabarata, as well as the spirit of the Laureate’s verse. Added to this very engaging feature of his work, there is a power of description that is very remarkable in a man to whom English is not his mother tongue. For example, “Seeta and Rama” commences with the following vignette:—... “All this is in excellent taste. And the same may be said of his delineations of character. He is never wearisome or trite, and ... he succeeds in enlisting the interest and sympathy of his reader and in proving that—as Mrs. Grant Duff lately said—there is ’an indefinite amount of beauty and charm in everyday life’ in Southern India.”—Madras Mail.
SEETA AND RAMA:—A very pretty and pathetic, though simple little story, told in the true poetic vein, and possesses a deep melancholy interest.... They are simple tales, told in English verse, which is characterised by a purity and a simplicity that are very noteworthy in an Indian writer, and which show considerable acquaintance of the English language, especially of Tennyson’s writings. Indeed, of them all is true what was said of the first poem, not only according to the Christian College Magazine, that some forms of expression seemed coined in the mint of Tennyson, but, according to the Statesman and Friend of India, that where the versification is best it has a ring of Tennyson.—Madras Times.
The style is simple and natural, and reminds us more often of Tennyson’s “Idylls of the King” than any other English poem that we can recollect now.... Throughout, the book is most finely written in rhyme, and the learned author has minted at the forge of Tennyson, to whom the book is most dutifully dedicated, the sentiments of Oliver Goldsmith, Parnell, and Byron.—Hindu.
We must congratulate Mr. Ramakrishna on the success which has attended his, no doubt, pleasing labours. He is the first Hindu graduate, so far as we know, who has come before the public as a poet, and well does he deserve every encouragement.—Madras Standard.
This little poem is an exquisitely finished, harmonious, well-written story of a pair of Hindu lovers.... Mr. Ramakrishna is extremely felicitous in the choice of his words, and his descriptions are so picturesque and vivid, and his narrative so stirring, that the reader feels as if spell-bound by the author’s great skill and power.... There can be no manner of doubt that the hand that wrote these poems is both strong and skilful, and was directed by a true spirit of poesy of a high order.—People’s Friend.
TENNYSON COMMEMORATION MEETING.—At the meeting held in the Christian College, Dr. Miller proposed that the chair should be taken by Mr. T. Ramakrishna Pillai, an old student of the College, who, as many of our readers know, has himself won no small success in the field of poetry.—Christian College Magazine.
Mr. T. Ramakrishna Pillai is probably the only one in Madras, and certainly the only native of India in Madras, who had come into any kind of personal contact with Lord Tennyson.—Speech of the Hon. the Rev. Dr. Miller at the Tennyson Commemoration Meeting.
BY T. RAMAKRISHNA, B.A.
With an Introduction by the Right Hon. Sir M.E. GRANT DUFF, G.C.S.I.
(London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1891.)
* * * * *
OPINIONS.
The Occidentals led by Macaulay had too complete a victory for the good of India. Much that they said and did was wise, but their system has failed in many ways, and was, indeed, never intended to breed up men interested in the past of their own land. Nearly all that has been learned about it has been learned by the labour of Europeans, and yet natives trained to European methods of research have facilities of kinds for prosecuting research which we have not.... I had a great deal to say on that subject, and on many other cognate ones in an address which I delivered in my capacity of Chancellor of the University of Madras, shortly before I left the country, but I do not know that it has had much effect since, though an excellent little book by Mr. Ramakrishna on the village life of South India is a step in the right direction. We want, however, quite a small library of works of that kind before the harvest that is ready for the sickle of intelligent native observers is gathered in.—The Right Hon. Sir M.E. Grant Duff, G.C.S.I., in the Contemporary Review.
The subject is interesting, and I do not doubt from the specimen which I saw that you would treat it in a fresh and agreeable way. What we need in Europe is to have the reality, the actual working of these Indian institutions which we have so often mentioned brought home to us, and probably such a writer as yourself may do this better than a European could do.—The Right Hon. James Bryce, D.C.L.
Ramakrishna,—a literary gentleman belonging to Madras, who has written a charming book called “Life in an Indian Village.”—Professor Eric Robertson in Macmillan’s series of Orient Readers.
I can name more than a dozen Indian authors whose works can fairly rank with some of the best productions of Englishmen. The well-known author of “Maxima and Minima,” viz., the late Professor Ramachundra, was considered by no other than De Morgan, the famous mathematician, as an original genius of a remarkable order. A celebrated Cambridge Mathematician once told me that he set a problem for the Mathematical Tripos, basing it upon Ramachundra’s “Maxima and Minima,” and with the exception of a few that headed the list, none were able to solve the problem. In the late Toru Dutt, a young Bengali native Christian lady, some of the leading literary men of England found a poet of no mean powers. Mr. Edmund Gosse writes as follows in the preface to her poems that have been published by an English firm: “It is difficult to estimate what we have lost in the premature death of Toru Dutt. Literature has no honours which need have been beyond the grasp of a girl who, at the age of twenty-one, and in languages separated from her own by so deep a chasm, had produced so much of lasting worth.... When the history of the literature of our country comes to be written, there is sure to be a page in it dedicated to this fragile exotic blossom of song.” Dr. Bandarkar of Bombay is considered to be one of the best Orientalists of the day. A number of Bengali gentlemen have earned a lasting fame by literary productions in English, among whom I may mention the Rev. Lal Behari Day, late Professor in the Hooghly College, and Mr. Dutt of the Bengal Civil Service. In our own Presidency Mr. Ramakrishna Pillai has produced a work in English—“Village Life in India”—that has won the praise of Sir Grant Duff.—Professor Satthianadhan’s Lecture on Intellectual Results in India.
Mr. Ramakrishna takes a typical village in the Madras Presidency, “the most Indian part of India,” and shows us in half a dozen lucid chapters that the wants of the villagers are all material—wells, roads, better breeds of cattle, and so on—and that they do not, and will not for a long time, care one cash for anything which happens, or which might be made to happen, in the great outer world beyond their palm-groves and rice-fields. There is nothing political in this pleasant little book, we are pleased to say, although we have drawn this political moral from it. It is a truthfully written account of native life in one of those 55,000 villages which dot the great district—a tract much larger than the British Isles—the daily existence of whose peaceful, and not altogether unhappy, population it is intended to illustrate; and it can be dipped into, or read through, with equal satisfaction and advantage,—Daily Telegraph (London).
“Life in an Indian Village” is an amusing and clear portrayal of the manners and customs of the inhabitants of a village in the Madras Presidency. The author first depicts his little community, and then proceeds to describe the avocations of all the leading personages. As Kelambakam may be taken as a type of thousands of such villages, the book will be found particularly interesting to those who are likely to be brought into contact with the natives of India. Sir M.E. Grant Duff has written an Introduction, in which he suggests how the simple villagers can be benefited by their European neighbours.—Morning Post (London).
The book itself is excellent, and gives a sketch of Indian village society from inside. It is possible, however, that the ordinary English reader will prefer to take his view of “the black men” from Mr. Kipling rather than from a representative of the natives themselves. If he wishes to have a native view of native life he will find it in this work.—Athenaeum (London).
India is always fertile in surprises for English readers. We know something of those among its peoples which have given us trouble; but here is a “dim population” of which many Englishmen will scarcely have heard the name—the Dravidians of the Madras Presidency, and we learn with something like astonishment that they number more than the inhabitants of England. The village which Mr. Ramakrishna describes for us is one of more than fifty thousand, averaging about five hundred inhabitants apiece. The first thing that strikes us in his account is its highly organised condition. It is a self-sufficing little commonwealth, in which a quite surprising variety of professions or occupations are represented.—Pall Mall Gazette (London).
We welcome this little book as a much truer picture of Indian life than many more ambitious works.—St. James’s Gazette (London).
The work is written in admirable English—even the blank verse is perfect. The story of Harichendra alone is worth the cost of the volume.—Literary World (London).
We have read with great pleasure the book, “Life in an Indian Village,” as it deals with an interesting and not at all unimportant subject in a plain and unpretending way. Simplicity has a powerful charm of its own; and we recommend the book to all whose heart can still be touched by inartificial descriptions of idyllic, gently flowing, country life. He who does not assume the tone of “India, what can it teach us?” but cares to profit by teaching, will learn a great deal even from these simple village tales.—Asiatic Quarterly Review (London).
What more England can do for India is admirably and tersely set forth in the Introduction, which, with Mr. Ramakrishna’s pleasant description of Indian village life, deserves to be widely read.—Mr. J.B. Knight, C.I.E., in the Indian Magazine (London).
Books about India by intelligent travellers have their uses, and books by Europeans who have lived for years in the country and studied the people are still more valuable, but it is only a native of India who can really show us Indian life as it is. There are already several books in English, by educated Indians, which give us valuable insight into what was once the unknown of Indian domestic and social life. Mr. T. Ramakrishna, whose “Life in an Indian Village” is introduced to the notice of the British public by Sir M.E. Grant Duff, has produced a series of very interesting sketches of the more important features of village life in the South of India. They will be found to be very readable, sometimes amusing, always interesting and instructive. Any one who reads this book with intelligence and care will be able to form for himself a very accurate picture of a Madras village, and to understand the composition of the village community, which is the basis of the whole framework of Indian social life.—Scotsman (Edinburgh).
Mr. Ramakrishna’s book is picturesque and sympathetic.—Manchester Guardian.
A well-written book, and one which gives a realistic description of a condition of life which is the outcome of centuries of isolation,—Leeds Mercury.
It is not an easy thing to acquire a clear conception of a life and a civilisation other in every respect to our own, and it may be reasonably questioned if one Englishman in a thousand has more than a very vague idea of what life in an Indian village is like. Here is a pleasant and graphic little volume. He may acquire that knowledge from the sketches of an Indian gentleman who knows the subject through and through, and has, moreover, so much of European culture that he is able to present the facts in a form that will not seem strange or incredible.—Birmingham Post.
A volume issued by Mr. T. Fisher Unwin, “Life in an Indian Village,” is a sample of the kind of book relating to our Eastern Empire that we should like to see multiplied. It is the production of a scholarly native, T. Ramakrishna, B.A., who writes excellent idiomatic English without the slightest tendency to Johnsonian eloquence.—Christian Leader (Glasgow).
The manners and customs of the people are vividly reflected in these pages, and a picturesque account is given of a number of notabilities, such as the physician, &c.—Speaker (London).
The book cannot fail to fulfil the author’s desire in exciting a deeper interest in the people whom he so sympathetically introduces to the British public.—Independent (London).
Written with much naivete.—British Weekly (London).
The author of this book deserves our thanks and congratulations. Himself a highly educated native of the Madras Presidency, he has drawn a series of pictures of the village life of Southern India.... The occupations, the recreations, the religion, the distribution of labour, the recurrence of feast and festival, with much more, are all told in amusing style and with such graphic power as to leave a vivid impression upon the reader’s mind.—Bookseller (London).
Madras should indulge some measure of pride in having turned out a University graduate who can write the English language better than most Englishmen. Ramakrishna’s “Life in an Indian Village” is a charming account of Dravidian homes and customs. It is the work of a young man who has profited by Western enlightenment, and yet feels a kindly glow in his heart for all that belongs to the humblest folk in his native land. His sympathy is beautiful, because it is devoid of any pretence or forced pathos. His language is choice, yet simply constructed. There is real literary flavour about this work, which has just been published by Fisher Unwin. When will the Punjab give us a young man who can feel and think and write like this?—Civil and Military Gazette (Lahore).
Mr. T. Ramakrishna, a graduate of the Madras University, may be congratulated on the success which seems likely to attend the publication of his well-written little book on “Indian Village Life.” Judging by the comments that have appeared in the English papers, it is just the kind of book the public at home wants, not too statistical to be readable, and not too ambitious in design to be trustworthy, but just a simple, picturesque account of the particular part of India which the author really knows.—London Correspondent of the Englishman (Calcutta).
The great virtue of Mr. Ramakrishna’s writing is the absence of pretence and fustian. Space is not wasted on ambitious and worthless descriptions of scenery, or on vague disquisitions of a sentimental character. Everywhere he is simple, straightforward, and effective.... Writing in excellent English, and in unexceptionable style, he tells plainly and simply what he has to say, and is the more successful because he is less ambitious.... It is to be hoped that Mr. Ramakrishna’s interesting sketches of Southern Indian village life will obtain a wide circulation in England. He is to be congratulated on having produced a work of no little merit and originality.—Madras Mail.
To doubters of the good results of Western education in this Presidency, better proof could hardly be given than is provided.