V.] BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. — 42 made it the mission of his life to travel to the various seats of learning, challenging scholars to free controversy. If he could win his laurels in this competition, he naturally enjoyed great esteem in the country and the scholars who were vanqui- shed acknowledged the fact of their defeat in an open letter presented to him. This letter was called ‘@y-%q or letter of victory. Kecava Kacmiri after having vanquished the scholars of the rest of India had come to Nava- dwipa, then the most important seat of Sanskrit learning in the country. There were veteran scho- lars at Navadwipa about this time; old Vasudeva Sarvabhauma, the first authority in Logic in India , Raghu Nandan Bhattacharyya whose jurispru- dence up till now governs Hindu society in Bengal ; and Raghu Nath Ciromani whose grand work, Chintamani Didhiti, a commentary on the Tattva Chintamoni by Gangeg Upadhaya is a monument of scholarship, and excelled the treatise it commented on, were all living. These were the intellectual giants of their period. But they were scholarly re- cluses who for many years had scarcely mixed with men. The people of Navadwipa, however, were proud of the scholarship of young Nimai, who was always eager to enter into controversy with others. They brought the veteran Kecgava to Nimai who received him cordially on the bank of the Ganges, where his Tola was situated. Nim&aiasked Kecava Kacmiri, himself, a reputed poet, to describe the Ganges as it flowed past in an extempore poem. A few moments passed, and like a noble stream, rich and rhythmical flow cf
