17G G. A. Gricrson — Fitrthcr Notes on Kdliddsa. [Not. 



The following papers were read — 



1. Some further notes on Kdliddsa. — By G. A. Grieeson. B. C. S. 



(Abstract.) 

 This paper contains some legendary traditions current in Behar, con- 

 cerning the famous poet Kalidasa, who was born at Damodarpur, a village 

 near the town of Achait in Tirhut. They are all chiefly illustrative of his 

 great powers of improvisation. The first legend narrates a story of his youth ; 

 how being at first little better than an idiot, he afterwards came to be pos- 

 sessed of his unrivalled power over the Sanskrit language by the special 

 interposition of the goddess Durga. The second legend is an amusing 

 story about Kalidasa at the court of Raja Sibhai Singh. This Raja was 

 a great patron of pandits ; but he was wont to regulate his patronage not 

 by their learning, but by their weight. Kalidasa being a small lean man, 

 persuaded a fat and unwieldy shepherd to accompany him and personate 

 his guru, promising that he would do all the talking, while the shepherd 

 should never utter a word. The ruse succeeded. The shepherd was in- 

 stalled as chief pandit at the Raja's court, and Kalidasa as his disciple. 

 One day, however, the shepherd forgot himself and spoke a word in his 

 vulgar idiom in the presence of the king and his court. Kalidasa, with 

 great presence of mind, composed a verse on the spur of the moment, in 

 which he made an ingenious defence of h\^ guru's blunder. This, of course, 

 did not save the shepherd, but made Kalidasa famou"s throughout the three 

 worlds. The third legend relates to the manner in which Kalidasa pro- 

 cured his admission to the court of king Bhoja, by first simulating gross 

 ignorance and afterwards confounding the king's chief pandit by a sudden 

 display of his remarkable power in composing extempore verses in Sanskrit. 

 The fourth legend relates an incident at king Bhoja's court ; how Kalidasa 

 by means of some ingeniously worded verses outwitted three pandits, who 

 through their great powers of memory had hitherto confounded all claim- 

 ants to the king's favour. The fifth legend relates how in the early years 

 of his ignorance Kalidasa conciliated his wife, who was a learned woman 

 and acted to him the part of a Xanthippe, by his miraculously acquired 

 knowledge. The sixth legend tells of a narrow escape of Kalidasa from 

 the clutches of a man-devouring pisdcTia by his gift of improvising verses. 

 The next two legends relate two other incidents at the court of king Bhoja, 

 which also illustrate the ready power of Kalidasa of composing Sanskrit 

 verse on the spur of the moment. Then follows a legend, showing how 

 Kalidasa used to do his marketing in improvised Sanskrit verse. The 

 series concludes with a legend, giving a conversation between Kalidasa and 

 his wife in extempore verses during a morning walk by the side of a tank 

 covered with lotuses. 



