Page:A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India Vol 1.djvu/106

84 satisfy the exigencies of their rhythm. The reiterated employment by them all of a certain set of stock words and phrases deprives their works of any appearance of individuality or originality, which, added to the extremely dull and uninteresting nature of the subject-matter of the poems themselves, makes them on the whole about the least attractive body of literature in the world. Still, there are, as I have said before, some exceptions: the seven hundred couplets of Bihâri Lâl contain many pretty, though fanciful, conceits, and are composed in extremely correct and elegant verse; and here and there among the religious poems may be found meditations and prayers of some merit. The Ramayan of Tulsi Dâs is probably only admired because the masses are unable to read the original of Valmiki. In modern times a perfect cloud of writers has arisen, amongst whom, however, it is impossible to single out any one deserving of special mention. The introduction of the Persian character, in supersession of the clumsy Nagari, has rendered the mechanical process of writing much easier and more rapid, while many good lithographic presses in all parts of the country pour forth books of all descriptions, the majority of them undoubtedly pernicious trash, but some here and there of a more wholesome tone, which, though probably not destined to live, may pave the way for productions of a higher style.

Bengal, however, has now far distanced all her sister provinces in literary activity. The rise of modern Bengali literature is due to the great reformer Chaitanya in the fifteenth century. The litanies or Kîrtans which, though they had existed before his time, he rendered popular, may still be collected, and I believe some Bengali gentlemen have made collections of them, with a view to publication. One, attributed to Vidyâpati,