246 LIFE AND WORK OF SIR JAGADIS C. BOSE 



restrictedly scientific, as its magnitude shows, nor yet 

 simply popular. The essential idea is that of providing 

 for the scientific exposition of new knowledge, and this 

 at its highest appeals to the intelligent public. 



The ornamentation of the hall appeals alike to scholar, 

 artist, and the student of science. The ceiling design, with its 

 great radiating lotus, is freely adapted from one of the 

 cathedral caverns of Ajanta, and is bordered with the 

 sensitive plants so specially connected with the work of the 

 Institute. The body of the Hall is left quiet and plain, as 

 befits its purpose of attention ; but above the lantern screen 

 an allegorical frieze has been painted ' The Quest/ by 

 Nandalal Bose, a well-known member of that little group 

 of Calcutta artists who are recovering the traditions of 

 Indian painting, and adapting them to modern interest and 

 to individual expression. Starting from the sacred river at 

 dawn, strides forth the tall and keen-braced figure of 

 Intellect, feeling the sword-edge with which he has to 

 cleave his way, and companioned in his adventurous 

 journey by his bride Imagination, who inspires him with her 

 I _magic flute. The final and focal ornament of the Hall is a 

 great relief in bronze, silver and gold, of the sun-god rising 

 in his chariot to the daily cosmic strife of light with darkness. 



How this new Institute may act and react with Indian 

 thought and life, as well as with the world's science, and 

 how also it may advance here industry, there agriculture, 

 there again medicine, and above all the needed emancipation 

 and renewal of higher education, it is too soon to predict. 

 Enough for the present that this flowering of a creative life 

 should now fully be opened. Its fruits will ere long be 

 maturing, and its seeds of new activities spreading through- 

 out India and flying over the world. 



The substance of the foregoing description was written 

 immediately after the opening of the Institute. Two 

 years have since elapsed, and already the hopes then enter- 

 tained are in the way of ample fulfilment. Two large 



