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ingredients which constituted the wonderful intellectual stamina and the striking personality of the renowned Bengali novelist, and which were, more than anything else, responsible for the brilliant fulfilment of the noble and epoch-making mission for which he lived and died to the glory of his country. It is also not within my scope or aim to furnish my readers with an analytical criticism of the literary merits of the great work, I have translated, and which manifests in a striking manner the admirable intellectual faculties and literary excellence with which its distinguished author was endowed.
To assign to Bankim Chandra his right place in the history of the Bengali literature—to give an accurate idea of the exact character of an intellect so complex and acute—and to unmistakably trace out the prospective and retrospecticve effects of its influence on the Bengali literature—is not an easy task. Suffice it to say, that Bankim Chandra renovated and improved the Bengali language and, in one word, so remodelled it as to bring it in contact with the modern Bengali life.
As regards Chandra Shekhar, I have already said that my readers should not look for an accurate and elaborate exposition of the beauty and grandeur of that great work of art, in this short prefatory note. Besides, if I would attempt at a detailed criticism of the whole work, here, it would deprive, at least, a par-
