Page:Twelve men of Bengal in the nineteenth century (1910).djvu/7

 PREFACE.

following pages attempt to give a necessarily short but, it is hoped, complete sketch of the lives of twelve among the most prominent men of Bengal in the Nineteenth Century. The difficulty of selection where so many names occur will be obvious. I have, however, by no means attempted to select the twelve most distinguished names of the century, but rather those whose lives may be regarded as typical of the varied conditions of Bengal during that momentous period in its history. The selection has been further guided by a desire to cover the whole of the century so that the book may be not only a record of the lives of Twelve Men of Bengal but a comprehensive though brief sketch of the wonderful revival, social, moral and intellectual, which came to the Province during the period. Among the six Hindus and the six Muhammadans, to whom the present volume has been limited, will be found the social reformer and the merchant prince, the religious revivalist and the philanthropist, the Government official and the educationalist, the descendant of a long line of ruling chiefs and the self-made man who won his own way to wealth and influence. If by serving to remind the people of Bengal of the splendid examples that the great men of their own race have set before them, and by bringing home to Englishmen a greater