1876.] F. S. Growse — Sri Swdmi Sari Dds of Brinddban. 317 



that the author of the Bhakt-Sindhu was the partisan of a schism in the 

 community, which occurred about 50 years or so ago, and that he has 

 moulded his facts accordingly ; for the Jagannath whom he brings over 

 from Kol is not named in a genuine list of the Mahants, which will be 

 given hereafter. That he is utterly at fault in his dates, sambat 1441 — 

 1537, is obvious at a glance ; for the Emperor who visited Brindaban was 

 certainly Akbar, and he did not ascend the throne till sambat 1612. It is 

 true that Professor Wilson in his Eeligious Sects of the Hindus, where he 

 mentions Hari Das, describes him as a disciple and faithful companion of 

 Chaitanya, who was born in 1485 and died in 1527 A. D. But although 

 Hari Das had imbibed the spirit of Chaitanya's teaching, I know of no 

 ground for maintaining that there was any personal intercourse between the 

 two ; had it been so, the fact would scarcely have escaped record in the 

 Bhakt-Mala or some one of its modern paraphrases. Moreover, I have by 

 me a small poihi of 680 patras, which gives a complete list of all the 

 Mahants and their writings from the founder down to the date of the MS., 

 which is sambat 1825. The list is as follows : Swami Hari Das, Bithal- 

 Bipul, Biharini Das, Nagari Das, Saras Das, Naval Das, Narhar Das, 

 Easik Das and Lalit-Kishori, otherwise called Lalit-mohani Das. Allowing 

 20 years for each incumbency, which is rather a high average, since only an 

 elderly man would be elected for the post, the date of Hari Das's death is 

 thrown back only as far as sambat 1665. His writings moreover are not 

 more archaic in style than the poems of Tulsi Das, who died in sambat 1680 ; 

 and therefore on all grounds we may fairly conclude as an established fact 

 that he flourished at the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th 

 century A. D., in the reigns of the Emperors Akbar and Jahangir. 



Each of the Mahants named in the above list is described as being the 

 disciple of his immediate predecessor, and each composed some devotional 

 poems, which are known as sdkhis, chaubolas, or padas. The most volu- 

 minous writer is Biharini Das, whose padas occupy 684 pages. In many 

 of them he expresses the intensity of his mystical devotion in terms of 

 exaggerated warmth, which are more suggestive of an earthly than a divine 

 passion. But the short extract that follows is of a different character, and 

 is of special interest as confirming the conclusion already stated as to the 

 date of Hari Das ; since it mentions by name both the Emperor Akbar and 

 also the death of his famous friend Birbar, which occurred in 1590 A. D. 



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