Page:Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer - A History of the Renaissance in Bengal.djvu/144

 Mr Lahiri was very much pleased by his guest’s scrupulous regard for truth, and invited him to become an inmate of his house. While here, Shama Charan Sirkar came to know Babu Ram Gopal Ghosh, already a man of influence, who got him appointed as tutor in Hindu to Mr Joseph, the head of the firm of Joseph & Co., and also to Mr Kelsall. But he felt that, in order to get on in the world, he ought to acquire a knowledge of English; and so, at the age of twenty-two, he began taking lessons in the language from Ramtanu Babu.

Another young man was afterwards received as a guest by the hospitable Mr Lahiri, our hero. It was Kartik Chandra Roy, with whose name the reader is familiar. This young man was admitted into the Medical College then recently established, and Ramtanu received him with a hearty welcome.

Though Ramtanu’s guests were happy in the enjoyment of one another’s company, yet often had they to rough it. They had by turns to cook, shop, draw water and do other household services; and we have been told that, owing to these hardships, Shama Charan Mitra left the house as soon as he could slightly better his condition, while Kartik Chandra’s health so gave way that he had to give up his studies and return home.

We need hardly say that Ramtanu was exceedingly kind to his brothers. In after years, Dr Kali Charan Lahiri was often heard to speak of the following incident with great emotion:— A few months before his examination he got some eye disease, and was told not to read. We can easily imagine his position then. On the one hand, his eyes were bad, and he was not to study, on the other hand the examination was pretty close. The poor lad was in a strait, when his loving brother, Ramtanu, solved the question for him. Every day, on returning from his duties in the