CHAPTER X KABIWALAS The existence of Kabi-songs may be traced to the beginning of the 18th century or even beyond it to the 17th, but the most flourishing period of the Kabiwalas was between 1760 and 1850. Rasu and Nrsimha_ were born somewhere between 1734 and 1738; Haru Thakur in 1738; Nitai Bairagi in 1747; so Le Sees ‘eae that between 1760 and 1780, they literature. had all reached the height of their reputation as songsters and made this form of literary amusement popular throughout the country. During the continuance of the dual government therefore between 1765 and 1775, and in the period of literary interregnum which followed upon the death of Bharat-chandra, they were the most considerable pretenders in the literary field; and if the mantle of the old authors did not exactly suit their narrow shoulders, they attempt- ed in the main to echo the sentiment and ideas of old- world poetry. Most of these greater Kabiwalas lived into the period of British rule. Rasu and Nrsirhha died between 1805 and 1807; but Haru Thakur lived up to 1812 and Nitai even beyond that to 1821. Ram Basu, though in a sense considerably junior to these earlier poets, having been born in 1786, died early in 1828. After these greater Kabiwalas, came their followers, disciples and imitators who maintained the tradition of Kabi-poetry up to the fifties or beyond it. The Kabi-poetry therefore covers roughly the long stretch of a century from 1760 to 1860, although after 1830 all the greater Kabiwalas one by one had passed away and Kabi-poetry had rapidly ০০০১০ len
