expression may be called a hybrid compromise between Eastern and Western ideas. So we find that the Bengali novel is to a great extent an exotic. It is a hot-house plant which has been brought from a foreign soil; but even crude imitations are better than the farragos of original nonsense, lists of which appear from time to time in the pages of the Calcutta Gazette.
The above remarks are merely general, and there exist, of course, bright and notable exceptions, among whom may be mentioned the names of Peary Chand Mitter (the father of Bengali novelists), Bunkim Chandra Chatterjea, Romesh Chandra Dutt, and Tarak Nath Ganguli.
The 'Alaler Gharer Dulál' of Peary Chand Mitter may be called a truly indigenous novel, in which some of the reigning vices and follies of the time are held up to scorn and derision. A deep vein of moral earnestness runs through all the writings of Peary Chand Mitter, and he takes the opportunity to interweave with the incidents of his story disquisitions on virtue and vice, truthfulness and deceit, charity and niggardliness, hypocrisy and straightforwardness. Not only general vices, such as drinking and debauchery, but particular customs, such as a Kulin's marrying a dozen wives, and living at their expense, are condemned in no measured terms. The book is written in a plain colloquial style, which, combined with a quiet humour, procured for it a considerable degree of popularity."
As further evidence, if such were wanting, of the popularity of this novel, it may be mentioned that it has been dramatized, having been published in the form of a natak or play, by Babu Hira Lall Mitter.
The leading characteristics of the novel, as they have appeared to the translator, are the humour, pathos, and satire that pervade almost every page of it.
