INTRODUCTION. 
XV 
It will be useful to insert here explanations of the Hindi terms 
corresponding to a few English technical terms used by me. The nine 
rasas or styles are as follows :— 
1. Sriygar Has, translated by 
me as “ the erotic style.” 
2. Hdsya Ras, 
ditto 
“ the comic style.” 
3. Karuna Has , 
ditto 
“the elegiac style.” 
4. Blr Bas, 
ditto 
“ the heroic style.” 
5. Rdudr ’ Has, 
ditto 
“ the tragic style.” 
6. Bhayanalc Has, 
ditto 
“ the terrible style.” 
7. Bibhatsa, 
ditto 
“ the satiric style.” 
8. Shdnti Has, 
ditto 
“ the quietistic style.” 
9. Adbhut Has, 
ditto 
“ the sensational style. 
These translations do not pretend to be exact. Each is simply a 
convenient representation of one Hindi word by one English one. 
An explanation of the terms Nakh’sikh, Nayak Bhed , and 
Ndyikd Bhed will be found in the foot-note to No. 87. 
The word Sdmayik, when used with reference t 9 a work, I have, 
not without hesitation, rendered by “ occasional.” Chetaoni I have 
translated by “ didactic.” By “ emblematic ” verses (in Hindi drisht 
kiit) I mean those fanciful enigmatic tours de force which are 
familiar to Sanskrit scholars who have studied the Nalddaya and the 
Kirdtarjunlya. 
( 6 .) Principles of Arrangement of the Contents. 
Endeavour has been made to arrange the contents as much as 
possible in chronological order. This has not always been easy, and in 
some cases it has been found to be impossible. Hence those poets 
whose dates I have been unable to fix, ever so tentatively, I have 
grouped together in alphabetical order in the last chapter. While the 
work was passing through the press I found myself unexpectedly in 
- 
possession of the approximate dates of a few of these when it was too 
late to introduce them into their proper places. They have therefore 
remained in the last chapter, but, to prevent mistakes, I have drawn 
attention to them in the addenda. 
The work is divided into chapters, each roughly representing a 
period. The sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries, the Augustan age 
of Indian vernacular poetry, occupy six chapters, not strictly divided 
according to periods of time, but according to groups of poets, 
commencing with the romantic poetry of Malik Muhammad, and 
including amongst others the Krisna cult of Braj, the works of Tul’sl 
Das (to whom a special chapter has been allotted), and the technical 
school of poets founded by Kesab Das, 
