1916. j The Poem Kumara-Sambhavam. 15 



up to the birth of the war god. Sixthly, on comparing with 

 the Raghuvamsam the intention of the poet appears to be to 

 end his poem in the sweetness of erotics (srrigara). Its last 

 (nineteenth) canto deals with the love and amorous dalliances 

 of the king Agnivarna. Similarly, the Kumara-sambhavam 

 should end in the eighth canto dealing with the loves of Siva 

 and Parvati. 



A consideration of these facts and others leads to the 

 conclusion that the cantos ninth to seventeenth are probably 

 spurious. At least it would be safer to treat them like 

 Nalodayam and other poems attributed to Kalidasa, as not 

 his until proved otherwise. 



In the present paper I do not propose to discuss the vexata 

 Tr -,. ,_ , ^. r^. , questio of Kalidasa's time. Twelve 



Kalidasa s Time — Third ^„uituj i. j- 



quarter of the fifth cen- y earS back I had an Occasion to dlSCUSS 



tury. this subject. I then came to the con- 



clusion that Kalidasa should belong to 

 a period of great culture, that this period can only be the period 

 of the Imperial Guptas, and that internal evidence point to his 

 flourishing in the time of Kumara Gupta and Skanda Gupta, 

 say in the third quarter of the fifth century a.d. 1 Since then I 

 have come across no authentic facts pointing otherwise, and so 

 must leave the date question as it was then. 



1 J.R.A.S. 1903. pp. ls:M8ti: Do., 1904, pp. 158*161. 



