The Hindu Wife Or The Enchanted Fruit Author:William Jones Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: TWO HYMNS TO P R A C R I T I. THE ARGUMENT. IN all our conversations with learned Hindus we find them enthusiastic admirers of Poetry, which they consi... more »der as a divine art, that had been practised for numberless ages in heaven, before it was revealed on earth by Va Lmi o, whose great Heroic Poem is fortunately preserved : the Brahmans of course prefer that poetry, which they believe to have been actually inspired; while the Vaidyas, who are in general perfect grammarians and good poets, but are not suffered to read any of the sacred writings except the Ayurveda, or Body of Medical Tracts, speak with rapture of their innumerable popular poems, Epic, Lyric, and Dramatic, which were composed by men not literally inspired, but called, metaphorically, the sons of Seeeswati, orMiNERVA; among whom the Pandits of all sects, nations, and degrees are unanimous in giving the prize of glory to Ca Li Da Sa, who flourished in the court of Vicrama Ditta, fifty-seven yeans before Christ. He wrote several Dramas, one of which, entitled Sacontala , is in my possession; and the subject of it appears to be as interest- Ing as the composition is beautiful: besides these he published the Meghaduta, or cloud-messenger, and the Naldday a, or rise ' of Nala, both elegant love-tales; the Raghuvansa, an HeroiePoem; and the Cuma'ra Sambhava, or birth of CtfMA EA, which supplied me with materials for the first of the following Odes. I have not indeed yet read it; since it could not be correctly copied for me during the short interval, in which it is in my power to amuse myself with literature; but I have heard the story told, both in Sanscrit and Persian, by many Pandits, who had no communication with each other; and their outline of it coincided so perfectly, that I am convinced of its correctness ...« less