It is necessary that he should be accomplished in the lighter arts, particularly poetry, music, and singing, and he appears indiscriminately as the companion of a man or woman, although, in the latter case, the female is the courtesan; he is generally represented on familiar, and easy, yet dependent terms with his associate, and evinces something of the character of the Parasite of the Greek comedy, but that he is never rendered contemptible.'-Wilson, p. 42.

In one of the dramas before us he plays rather an important and by no means a degrading part.

Sir W. Jones, it appears, was misinformed, when he was led to suppose that the Indian theatre would fill as many volumes as that of any nation in ancient or modern Europe. Mr. Wilson doubts whether the extant plays amount to many more than sixty. But they seem to make up in variety of structure for their small number. The Indian critics have classed them with the minuteness of Polonius, they have tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral,-scene individable and poem unlimited.' But, strictly speaking, tragedy, with her bowl and dagger,' may not tread the Indian stage,-this gentle people will not endure the sight of blood,-nor is the rule that of the stern but decorous Greeks;

'Nec pueros coram populo Medea trudicet.'

Though death may take place behind the scenes, and the interest is sometimes excited by fearful situations, a tragic catastrophe is prohibited by a positive rule, and the death of either the hero or heroine is never to be announced.* On the whole, from the Sakontalà (the Moon of Intellect, translated by Dr. Taylor, is of a distinct class, more analogous to our ancient Lingua, or Randolph's Muses' Looking Glass), and from the dramas now before us, if we were to compare the theatre of India to any European drama, we should certainly select that of Spain; and when Schlegel, speaking of the graceful and brilliant Sakontalà, gave the countenance of his authority to the resemblance between Calidàsa and Shakspeare, we wonder that the other great object of his admiration, Calderon, did not the rather occur to him.

Mrichchacati, or the Toy Cart, the first translation in Mr. Wilson's volumes, opens with imploring the accustomed benediction from Siva. This is followed, according to rule, with an interlude, something in the manner, but guiltless of the wit, of the Prelude to the Taming of the Shrew, in which Christophero Sly

Mr. Wilson likewise informs us that Hindu bienséance proscribes other acts, as unfit for the scene,-'The excepted topics of a serious nature, are hostile defiance, solemn imprecations, exile, degradation, and national calamity; whilst those of a less grave or comic character, are biting, scratching, kissing, eating, sleeping, the bath, unction, and the marriage ceremony.'-p. 12.

plays

plays so distinguished a part. Here the manager is the chief personage; and the object is to announce the play about to be performed, and by this very inartificial contrivance to insinuate the plot into the boxes.' All these interludes are evidently modern, and have been prefixed to the more popular and celebrated plays on their revival; their authority is a point of great importance in the history of the Indian drama. The play before us is announced as the work of a celebrated King, Sudraka, who terminated a life of the highest political, literary, and religious distinction, by voluntarily entering the fatal fire,' like the Calanus and other Indian Sages, who excited the astonishment and admiration of the Greeks. According to one calculation, Sudraka lived one hundred and ninety-two years after the Christian æra, by another before it; but we must acknowledge that both dates appear to rest on but slender and unsatisfactory evidence; nor do we understand how Mr. Wilson reconciles his strongest argument for the antiquity of the Toy Cart,' the remarkable fact that the Budhist and Brahminical religions appear co-existing almost in amity, at least by no means in fierce and intolerant hostility, with the appearance of the same historical phenomenon in the Madhava and Malatì, to which he assigns, on more solid grounds, the much later date, A. D. 720. If in the work attributed to king Sudraka, the Budhists, though denominated heretics, enjoy perfect toleration, and their monasteries appear to flourish under the royal protection, in the later play the virtues and the gentleness of the Budha priestess are strongly contrasted with the bloodthirsty and ferocious hierophants of the dark rites of the Sivaite superstition. Her intimate connexion with the hero and heroine shows clearly to which side the poet intended the interest of his audience to incline. Those who are aware of the great importance of throwing light on the relation of these two religions to each other, in every question of Indian history and antiquities, will excuse this short digression. Nothing has caused so much perplexity as the co-existence, at different periods, of the symbols of Budhism and Brahminism, in general thought to have been opposed to each other with implacable hostility, as for instance in the great cave temples, particularly those of Ellora. We will merely add, that the insurrection of a cowherd, and his dethronement of the ruling sovereign, is rather a singular incident to be celebrated by a royal poet.

But at whatever time, or by whatever poet it was written, this drama displays a very singular picture of Indian manners, and we must add, of Indian morals. The poets and novelists of polygamous countries certainly enjoy one inestimable privilege; when they have sufficiently excited our interest by the passion of two ' rival

6

'rival queens' for one hero, they have an easy way of extricating themselves from the embarrassment, by permitting him to marry both. So the Chinese novelist, in the very curious tale, the 'Two Cousins,' translated by Mons. Rémusat, and reviewed in this journal a few years ago; and so in the present drama, the lawful wife, though she has actually prepared a suttee, in expectation of the death of her lord, submits, without remonstrance, and apparently without the least jealous reluctance, to her husband's additional union with the heroine of the piece. This heroine is neither more nor less than a courtezan, but no low or mercenary being; she is a wealthy and highly accomplished female, as Mr. Wilson observes, like the hetaira of the Greeks. Her passion for the hero is full of the deepest devotion and disinterestedness; it rests on her admiration of his noble and virtuous character, which, although he has sunk into the lowest state of poverty, commands universal respect; and for him she rejects the importunities of the king's brother. We fear that in our rapid sketch we shall scarcely give a clear notion of an extremely lively plot, full of quick and sudden turns, and even more busy and diversified, both in the incidents and characters which it brings forward, than most Spanish comedies. The scene opens with the lamentations of the gracioso, the friend of the Bramin Charudatta, at whose hospitable board he had been accustomed to feast, but who is now reduced to the utmost poverty. To Charudatta himself, the Brahmin, among the bitterest of the feelings excited by his humbled state, is the scantiness of his offerings to his household gods. Alas! how changed, the offerings to the gods, That swans and stately storks, in better times, About my threshold flocking, bore away;

Now a scant tribute to the insect tribe

Falls midst rank grass, by worms to be devoured.'

He laments his poverty, but in a fine, manly spirit:

'I do not, trust me, grieve for my lost wealth;

But that the guest no longer seeks the dwelling
Whence wealth has vanished, does, I own, afflict me.
Like the ungrateful bees, who wanton fly

The elephant's broad front when thick congeals
The dried up dew, they visit me no more.

'Tis true, I think not of my wasted fortunes.
As fate decrees, so riches come and vanish.
But I lament to find the love of friends
Hangs all unstrung, because a man is poor.
And then with poverty comes disrespect;
From disrespect does self-dependence fail;
Then scorn and sorrow, following, overwhelm

The

The intellect; and when the judgment fails,
The being perishes; and thus, from poverty,
Each ill that pains humanity proceeds.'

6

The next scene presents us with Vasantasenà, the courtesan pursued by the king's brother,—a character who rather reminds us of the queen's son, Cloten, in Cymbeline;' but Samsthanaka is a kind of literary coxcomb, and sadly misquotes the poets. He is attended by the Vità, a character which we have before described. While Vasantasenà is struggling in vain to escape, the door of Charudatta's house opens, and the maid, Radanika, comes out. Vasantasenà, in the dark, slips within the door, and the maid is seized by mistake, but she is rescued by the gracioso, who asserts with great spirit the Brahminical dignity, and the inviolability of his mansion; nor indeed does he treat the king's relative with much respect-a trait which strikingly exemplifies the sanctity of the Brahminical character. Even the Vità is struck with reverence by the virtues of the noble Brahmin.

VITA.-I am afraid. SAMSTHANAKA. Of what?

VIT. Of the eminent virtues of Charudatta.

SAMS.-Very eminent, indeed, when they cannot afford his visiters a dinner.

VIT. Never mind that; he has become impoverished by his liberality, like the lake in the summer, which is exhausted by relieving the thirst of the travellers. In his prosperity he was kind to all, and never treated any one with disrespect.

SAMS.-Who is this slave? the son of a slave? Is he a warrior? a hero? Is he Pandu? Swetaketu?-(And so the prince runs on through a whole list of mythological names.)

VIT. No. I will tell you what he is. He is Charudatta, the tree of plenty to the poor, bowed down by its abundant fruit. He is the cherisher of the good, the mirror of the wise, a touchstone of piety, an ocean of decorum, the doer of good to all-of evil to none; a treasure of manly virtues-intelligent, liberal, and upright. In a word, he only is worthy of admiration. In the plenitude of his merits he may be said to live: other men merely breathe. we had better depart.'

So come,

The scene within the house, between Charudatta and Vasantasena, is conducted with the utmost courtesy and propriety. The lady departs, leaving a valuable casket of jewels in the charge of the Brahmin. The two following acts open scenes of Indian low life: an adventure at the door of a gambling-house, and an act of burglary, executed with an ingenuity which might move the envy of some of the worthy opponents of the new police in our metropolis. Both, however, advance the progress of the story, by introducing characters which contribute to the denouement.

The

The thief, of course, steals the casket of the courtesan, and the gracioso is despatched to her dwelling (where the casket had already arrived by another course) to replace the loss by a valuable chain of jewels, cheerfully sacrificed by the Brahmin's wife, lest her husband's honour should be impeached. The description of the dwelling of this oriental Aspasia appears to us so curious that we shall give it at length.

'ATTENDANT.-This is the outer door, Sir.

MAITREYA. *—A very pretty entrance, indeed. The threshold is very neatly coloured, well swept and watered; the floor is beautified with strings of sweet flowers; the top of the gate is lofty, and gives one the pleasure of looking up to the clouds; whilst the jasmine festoon hangs tremblingly down, as if it were now hanging on the trunk of Indra's elephant. Over the door is a lofty arch of ivory; above it, again, wave flags, dyed with safflower, their fringes curling in the wind, like fingers that beckon me, Come hither. On either side the capitals of the door-posts support elegant crystal flower-pots, in which young mango-trees are springing up. The door-pannels are of gold, like the stout breast of a demon, stuck with studs of adamant. The whole cries "Away!" to a poor man; whilst its splendour catches the eye of the wisest.

ATT. This leads to the first court.

Enter, Sir, enter.

(They enter the first court.)

MAIT.-Bless me! why here is a line of palaces as white as the moon, as the conch, as the stalk of the water-lily! The stucco has been laid on here by handfuls. Golden steps, embellished with various stones, lead to the upper apartments, where the crystal windows, festooned with pearls, and bright as the eyes of a moon-faced maid, look down upon Ujayin. The porter dozes on an easy chair, as stately as a Brahmin deep in the Vedas; and the very crows, crammed with rice and curds, disdain the fragments of the sacrifice, as if they were no more than scattered plaster. Proceed.

(They enter the second court.) MAIT.-Oh! here are the stables. The carriage oxen are in good case, pampered with jawasa, I declare; and straw and oil-cakes are ready for them: their horns are bright with grease. Here we have a buffalo snorting indignantly, like a Brahmin of high caste whom somebody has affronted; here the ram stands to have his neck well rubbed, like a wrestler after a match; here they dress the manes of the horses; here is a monkey tied as fast as a thief; and here the mahauts (elephant drivers) are plying the elephants with balls of rice and ghee. Proceed.

ATT.-This, Sir, is the third gateway.

(They enter the third court.) MAIT.-Oh! this is the public court, where the young bucks of

*The gracioso-the friend and messenger of Charudatta.

Ujayin