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mogony and philosophy for Hindu education. It is, however, a distinctly sacred book, the reading of which cleanses from sins, and is esteemed of value beyond "wealth and wives." The magnitude of the translator's task may be judged from these facts, but not less from the range of the subject, and the difficulties of the highly inflexional language of classic India. The part now published contains the introduction of the Adiparvan, including the dithyrambic speech or chorus of Dhrita-rashtra, giving a bird's-eye view of the ground covered by the epic. This speech, and indeed the whole of the present instalment, is translated with great fidelity and spirit. The translator declares his intention of adhering to the original, even at the sacrifice of the English idiom; but this does not seem to us the danger to which he is most exposed. Here and there one comes on phrases which are so peculiarly English as to suggest rather a comic and jarring effect. An example of this is afforded in the incident where Utanka is called upon to "do the needful." As a rule, the more simple the English the better, always, of course, avoiding vulgar or slovenly forms of expression. It is enough, however, to say that the versions seems a close and reliable one, and that the style on the whole is fairly in harmony with the tenour of the great narrative poem. The first English version of the Mahabharata promises to take a high and permanent place in the literature of Oriental scholarship. All educated Englishmen have now a superficial knowledge of the Sanskrit epics, if only through Max Muller's luminous lectures, but by means of this grand project of the Bharata Karyalaya, one of the secret chambers of Oriental study is unlocked, and the Mahabharata is made the common property of all readers.—Sind Gazette.
We have to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of the first part of an English Translation of the Mahabharata published by the founder and energetic secretary of the Datavya Bharata Karyalaya. We of Behar hail the appearance of this publication with feelings of very great pleasure—and of peculiar satisfaction. Hitherto the efforts of the Karyalaya were confined to the publication of translations in Bengali of the great religious epics of the Hindus, but though very useful to the people of the publisher's own part of the country, the rest of India was shut out from participating in the fruits of its labours.—English has now become the Lingua Franca of India and the productions of its master minds in an English dress cannot fail to be duly valued by the whole of that vast continent. That the Mahabharat has been selected as the first work on which to devote its labour of love is a matter on which we can sincerely congratulate the Karyalaya. Apart from its sanctity and importance in the eyes of all pious Hindus, from a religious point of view, its literacy worth as one of the greatest and best Epic poems that the world has ever produced never can be sufficiently over-estimated. Speaking of it and the Ramayana, Professor Monier Williams says, "The Hindus like the Greeks have two
