Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/835

 VI.] BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. 793 influenced by one another’in many respects. [n Ksemananda’s Manasa Mangala, written more than 300 years ago, we find a passage in which it is told that in the steel-house made for Laksmindhara, along with many other charms to ward off evil in- fluences, a copy of the Koran was kept. Many a Mahomedan offered puja at Hindu temples, as the Hindus offered szzmz at Mahomedan mosques. In the N. W. P. the Hindus celebrated the Maho- rum festivals with as great enthusiasm as. the Mahomedans. Mirza Hosen Ali, a native of the Tippera district, who lived a hundred years ago; not only composed songs in praise of the goddess Kali, but worshipped her at his house with great eclat; and Gariv Hosen Chaudhury of Dacca, a contemporary of the Mriza, another Mahomedan zeminder, was a devout worshipper of (Citala Devi, the goddess of small pox, worshipped by the Hindus.* Gol Mahamud is to-day the leader of a professional party of singers in Tippera who sing only praises of the goddess Kali, and his party carries the palm in this respect and gets engagements in preference to Hindu parties at the houses of the orthodox Hindus. Hindus -have horne Mahomedan names and the Mahomedans are often called by Hindu names and such instances in the jungles on the banks of the Boori Ganga, where he chanced to see an image of Citala Devi in clay placed on the sand bank, and calling her a witch, aimed a shot at the clay image, as a mark of his contempt. The bullet fell on one of the eyes of the image, and disfigured that side of the face. That night Gariv Husen caught fever, and the symptoms of small pox quickly followed. The goddess is said to have appeared to him in a dream and told him that she would spare his life, but take one of his eyes, as he had done hers. Gariv Husen recovered with the loss of an eye, and since then turned into a devout votary of the goddess. 100
 * Gariv Husen Choudhury, when only 24, had gone a-hunting