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MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 



Nala and Damayanti, and other Poems ; translated from the Sanscrit, 

 with Notes, Mythological and Critical. By the Rev. HENRY HART 

 MILMAN, M.A. &c. Oxford. Talboys. Small 4to. 1835. 



NALA and Damayanti is the most interesting, beautiful, and popular poem 

 in the whole range of Sanscrit literature : no light praise, seeing that not only 

 the Vedas, the sacred books of the Hindoos, are composed in verse, but nearly 

 all their treatises on science, their laws, and even their dictionaries and gram- 

 mars. The late period, however, at which this important volume came to our 

 hands will not allow us, on the present occasion, to do justice to this metrical 

 picture of Indian life and love ; although we promise ourselves the pleasure 

 of making the attempt before the publication of our next number. 



But Mr. Milman, besides the story of Damayanti, has given us translations 

 of three minor, but not less pleasing, specimens of Sanscrit poetry ; and we 

 shall endeavour to convey to our readers some idea of the gratification which 

 a hasty perusal of these has afforded us. 



The first of them is the Death of Yajnadatta, an extract from the Ramayana 

 of Valmeki. It may not be amiss to premise that the Ramayana itself is an 

 immense epic of 24,000 slokas, or couplets, divided into seven books. It 

 gives an account of the banishment of Rama, under the name of Chandra, or 

 Moon-resembling ; of his wandering to the peninsula of Hindoostan ; of the 

 seizure of his wife by a giant king of Ceylon ; of his miraculous conquest of 

 that island, and of his restoration to the kingdom of his ancestors. A fair 

 notion of the esteem in which it is held among the Hindoos may be formed 

 from its introduction, in which it is said, " He who sings and hears this poem 

 frequently, has reached the highest state of enjoyment, and will finally be 

 equal to the gods." This may seem extravagant ; yet the praise of a celebrated 

 French Sanscrit scholar, Professor Chezy, in a discourse on this language, deli- 

 vered to the Royal College of France, is not far behind it : " It is more espe- 

 cially/' says he, " in epic poems that the Sanscrit seems to bear the palm 

 from all other languages ; and among the Indian poets, the great Valmiki, in 

 his Ramayana, seems to have best understood the art of displaying all its 

 beauties. Under his magic pencil it becomes pliant, and yields, without effort, 

 to every variety of tone and colour. If he would paint gentle and affecting 

 scenes, this beautiful, sonorous, and copious language furnishes him with the 

 most harmonious expressions ; and, like a winding rivulet creeping softly over 

 banks of moss and flowers, it carries with it, imperceptibly, our ravished 

 imagination, and transports us into an enchanted world. Yet, in subjects 

 requiring energy and strength, as in martial combats, his style becomes rapid 

 and animated as the action itself. Chariots roll and rebound ; furious ele- 

 phants destructively move to and fro their enormous tusks ; neighing steeds 

 clash their metalled hoofs on the resounding plain ; clubs are violently struck 

 together ; arrows hurtle; confusion and death rage on every side : we no longer 

 read, we are transported into the midst of the terrible conflict." 



The Death of Yajnadatta charms by its tender simplicity and the depth of 

 feeling with which it abounds. The story is as follows : Dasaratha, by the 

 arts of one of his wives, is obliged to send his victorious son Rama into banish- 

 ment on the day of his marriage with the beautiful Sita. The poem describes 

 the distress and* misery of the father deprived of his favourite son. 



Scarcely is Rama departed, before king Dasaratha, sorrowing deeply at his 

 No. 8. M.M. 2 D 



