Page:History of Bengali Literature in the Nineteenth Century.djvu/114

 90 BENGALI LITERATURE Master.! He died in India on September 10, 1815.2 Besides Vocabulary, Forster also wrote an Essay on the Principles of Sanserit Grammar (1810). The first part of the Vocabulary was published in 1799: while the second part appear- Vocabulary ;itsscope ed in 1802. The full title of and value. the work, which will _ sufficiently explain its scope, is: “ A Vocabulary in two paris, English and Bengalee and vice versa by H. P. চি? appears from Dodwell and Miles, Bengal Civil Servants, 1839, (pp. 182-8: supp. list, pp. 600-1) that from 1798 to 1803 as well as 1812 to 1815, Forster was out of employ. See also Bengal Almanac and Annuai Directory, 1815, p. 9. traced. No mention either in the Bengal Obituary or in De Rozario’s Monumental Register. For further particulars of his life, see references quoted above ; also Dictionary of National Biography ; Allibone, Dictio- nary of British and American Authors. Marshman, (Life and Times of Carey etc., 1859, vol. i., p. 71) spells the name as Foster, which form is not correct. 8 The date of publication given in Ram-gati Nydyaratna, Bangabhasa O Sahitya Bigayak Prastab, 8rd Ed., p. 192, is 1801 which is clearly erroneous. The date given in Dinesh Chandra Sen, History of Bengali Language and Literature, 1911, p. 868 (where the book is described as “‘ Bengali Dictionary by Forster, a Civilian and Sanskrit Scholar”) is 1719 which seems to be an obvious mistake or misprint for 1799. The account given in this latter work is mainly based on Rey. J. Long’s Catalogue, but Long’s book was compiled not till 1855 and contains more than one inaccurate statement. See also the notification in the Calcutta Gazette, dated August 26, 1802, in which “Mr, Forster has the pleasure to acquaint the subscribers of his Bengalee Vocabulary, that the second part is entirely printed off, and will be ready for delivery all:in the present month of August and as he has more than doubled the size of the work beyond what he engaged, he hopes this will be admitted as a sufficient excuse for the delay in the publication.” (Seton-Karr, Selections from Calcutta Gazette, vol. iii, p. 561). It is clear that the work was published in two instalments in 1799 and 1802,
 * He died probably in Calcutta, but his burial place cannot be