Page:Love in Hindu Literature.djvu/16

2 chakravākas and mayuras, of ashokas and kadambas, champakas and tamālas of the dark Yamunā and darker tresses of damsels, of the lovely moon and the lovelier "moon-face," of the clinking of the anklets and the flutter of the wimple, of the grove-trysts after night-fall and the " primrose path of dalliance," and of the thousand and one love-tonics furnished by nature or devised by art. Here we have "The Earthly Paradise" as it were, of an Indian William Morris.

It need be noted, however, at the very outset, that Coomaraswamy's exhibiting of the India of joy and beauty is not the first in point of time. The Madana of Tagore's Chitra has already imported for us the "fragrant wine of heaven" from the "Divine storehouse," and we have watched how Arjuna " drains his first draught of pleasure," and Chitra experiences the "rarest completion of life's desire, the first union of love." For this tiny lyrical play or dramatic lyric is indeed the most human and eminently readable of all Tagore's efforts in English. The real " lyric of love and life " is not the Gardener, but Chitra. Sonorous words, well-poised phrases, exquisite lines, and an almost perfect rhythm grace every page of this 'play' in one act, which is really a single sentiment done into a full-throated song long-drawn-out. And the very atmosphere of this delicate composition seems alive with intense passion.