Page:History of Bengali Literature in the Nineteenth Century.djvu/416

 352 BENGALI LITERATURE Ramnidhi Gupta was born in 1741 A. D. (1148 B. 8.) in the house of his maternal uncle at the village of Champta near Tribeni.!. His father lived at Kumartuli in Caleutta where Nidhu’s descendants still reside. Nidhu came with ase his father to Caleutta in 1747 where he learnt Sanscrit and Persian and also a bit of English from a missionary. Through the efforts of his co-villager Ramtanu Palit, dewan of Chhapra Collectorate, he obtained ® in 1776 the situation of a clerk in the same office where he continued for 18 years. He gave up the post through a difference of opinion with his official superior Jaganmohan Mukhopadhyay who had succeeded Ramtanu in the office of the dewan, and returned to Calcutta. While residing in Chhapra, Nidhu used to learn the theory and practice of music from an expert Mohammedan musician but on finding after some time that the master was unwilling to impart his knowledge to such a quick-witted disciple he gave up Mohammedan music and himself began to compose Bengali songs on the pattern of Hindi tappas. He married thrice in 1761, in 1791, and in 1794 or 1795. By his first wife he had a son who died early; but by his third wife he had four sons and two daughters, of whom the eldest son and daughter and the youngest died in his life time. He lived almost for a century and died at the very advanced age of 97 in 1839.4 1 These biographical details are gathered from various sources but chiefly from the account written by Isvar Gupta in his Sambad Prabhakar (Sraban 1261 B.S.) from which is compiled also the life prefixed to the 3rd edition of Nidhu Babus Gifaratna, published in 1257 B. 8. 2 Narayan, Jaistha, 1323, p. 739. s Journal of the Bengal Academy of Literature, vol. i, no. 6, p. 4. 1 For more details, see my article in Sahitya. Parigat Patrika, 1324, pp. 108-110.