Page:History of Bengali Literature in the Nineteenth Century.djvu/456

 432 - BENGALI- LITERATURE These short lyrics are, however, inadequate for giving an idea of Raghunandan’s style; but they will sufficiently indicate both his merits and defects. Raghunandan is by no means a slovenly writer but in his striving after technical perfection, he is often elaborate and artificial. His writings display faultless execution and a great command over the language ; but ingenuity and verbal or rhythmie dexterity ean never supply perennial nutriment for art. It is only when Raghunandan rises above these prepossessions—and he does this not very seldom—that he exhibits poetical quality of no mean order. Next to Raghunandan, the royal poet Jaynarayan Ghosal of Bhikailas (1751-1821) deserves mention. After spending the greater portion of his Gua Ghosal, life in the service of the Nawab and in the confidence of the company Jay- narayan obtained the title of Maharaja Bahadur from the Emperor of Delhi. During his last days, he passed a retired life of religious devotion at Benares where he has left too many traces of his large-hearted benevolence.! It was here that he conceived the idea of translating the A@é- Khanda into Bengali. The whole history of the under- taking is said forth by Jaynarayan himself in the last chapter of his work.? The translation, begun in 1792, was completed in a hundred chapters (about 11,200 lines) under the joint authorship of Jay-narayan, Nrsithha Deb Ray of Patuli, Jagannath Mukhopadhyay, BakreSvar Pafichanan and several other scholars and poets. After the completion of the hundred chapters, several supplemen- tary chapters, which stand by themselves, were added by 1 For more détails about his life, see Sahitya Parisat Patrika, ৮০1, vii, p, 1-25; Sahitya, 302 pp. 1491-6; Preface to the Sahitya Parisat edition of Jaynaraéyan’s Kasi-parikrama, 2 See Kaii-parikrama (Sahitya Parisat edition), Ch. xiii, pp. 222-24,