than that diligent and impartial difcrimination, which alone can render our labours ufeful to the public. We are forry to learn, by an angry, and rather impolite, letter from Mrs. MacaulayGraham, that this lady is diffatisfied with our criticism on her Letters on Education;' in which, after the fulleft and most deliberate confideration, we expreffed our unbiaffed fentiments; and in which, on revifal, we find nothing material to retract. If we pointed out fome particulars in the work, which did not accord with our judgment;-if we could not agree with this ingenious fpeculator, concerning the method of treating infants, the utility of amufing modes of inftruction, the propriety of her plan of ftudy, the expediency of transferring theatrical entertainments from the evening to the morning, and fome other fubjects;-why fhould a mere difference in opinion be treated as a ground of offence? In expreffing our difapprobation of the cenfure which this lady pafies on the practice of the reformed churches, in putting the facred fcriptures into the hands of children and ignorant adults, as the grand fource of infidelity and fanaticifm, we only hazarded an opinion contrary to that of the author. We ventured, indeed, to question the advantage of keeping young perfons ignorant of the fcriptures, during the period when habits and principles are formed: but it was by no means our intention to infinuate a doubt concerning the writer's friendly difpofition toward the interefts of morality and religion. Whether Mrs. M. G.'s opinions, or ours, are most confonant to truth, and what degree of applaufe is due to her fpeculations on education, it remains with the public to determine. Our only reafon for bringing the subject of these letters again before our readers, is, to exprefs our regret, that our duty to the public fhould have obliged us in any degree to hurt the feelings of a female writer; of whofe abilities as an hiftorian, we have often expreffed our unequivocal admiration, in whofe general principles of civil policy we have always heartily concurred, and to whom, notwithstanding the defects which we obferved in this laft production, we readily afcribe the merit of great intellectual energy, united with the purest philanthropy. E. ** The Reviewers commend Y. Y. for his diligence: but, fully, and more than fully, occupied as they are with their own affairs, it is impoffible for them to answer his letter of queries: for of fuch it chiefly confifts. +*+ B. M.'s letter arrived too late in the month, to receive the attention which it requires. We shall notice it in our next Number. ttt We are perfuaded that it would be very imprudent and unneceffary to comply with the hint of A very Old Friend.' 1* We are favoured with Mr. Johnfone's polite letter, and its contents fhall have due confideration. The work mentioned by this gentleman was fo far from being forgotten by us, that our ac count count of it was intended for this month's Review: but the article was found to be too large for its allotted space. It will, moft probably, appear in our next Number. *1* An Old Correfpondent' is mistaken in fuppofing, that we fhall not wish to hear from him again. We fhall be very happy to receive the fecret anecdotes relative to our work, of which he profeffes himself to be in poffeffion; and if he trusted us with his name, his neck fhould not fuffer. Itt We have to acknowlege the receipt of another letter from Obfervator. When we objected to Col. Pearfe's method of deter mining the longitude, we did not object to what might be done by additional means. Col. P. did not propofe to obferve Jupiter's declination; and, evidently, did not intend it: but, if he had, it would only have taken away an error to which we did not then advert. His method would ftill be fo far from determining the difference of longitude, as exactly as the latitude can be determined, that it would be as much worse than the method of doing it by the eclipfes of the fatellites, as the obfervations of the immerfions of the fatellites on to Jupiter's body, and of the emerfions from it, are more inaccurate than obfervations of their eclipfes; which every one knows are not the most exact means of determining the longitudes of places. No perfon will be furprised that an Obfervator could not fee errors in artificial horizons, who could not fee two images of the fun in the telescope of his fextant, when he looked at the fun's image on a reflecting furface, the index of the fextant being set to the fun's diameter. Common fenfe must inform every one that there is the fame reafon for feeing two images, when he looked at the fun's image in the reflecting horizon, that there is for feeing two images when he looks at the fun itfelf; provided the extent of the reflecting plane be fufficient to allow for the parallax caufed by the distance of the two glafjes of the fextant. ttt Letters from J. F., Hint, &c. &c. are just received. W. The Conductor of the Monthly Review hopes that no Correfpondent who does him the honour of addreffing to him, letters which may feem to require a private anfwer, will deem his commucation flighted, if acknowleged only in the printed notices, as ufual, at the end of each Review. Any other mode of acknowlegement, of fuch favours, would add too much to the neceffary duties of a very laborious office. ERRATA in the Review for December. Page 443. line 17. from bottom, for regulating, read relegating. 17. from bottom, for Sorbonian, read Serbonian. In the Running Titles of pp. 425, 426, 427, for Vol. II. read Vol. V. - 464. THE MONTHLY REVIEW, For FEBRUARY, 1791. ART. I. Sacontala; or, The Fatal Ring: an Indian Drama. By Cálidás. Tranflated from the original Sanfcrit and Prácrit. 4to. pp. 98. 7s. 6d. Boards. Edwards. 1790. ΤΗ HIS tranflation is faid to come from the pen of Sir William Jones; and if we poffeffed no other evidence than what is afforded by the preface, that alone would be fufficient to justify the affertion. The circumftances, by which he was induced to undertake the tranflation, are thus related: • In one of the letters which bear the title of EDIFYING, though most of them fwarm with ridiculous errours, and all must be confulted with extreme diffidence, I met, fome years ago, with the following paffage: "In the north of India there are many books, called Nátac, which, as the Bráhmens affert, contain a large portion of ancient history without any mixture of fable;" and having an eager defire to know the real ftate of this empire before the conqueft of it by the Savages of the North, I was very folicitous, on my arrival in Bengal, to procure access to thofe books, either by the help of tranflations, if they had been tranflated, or by learning the language in which they were originally compofed, and which I had yet a ftronger inducement to learn from its connection with the adminiftration of juftice to the Hindus; but when I was able to converfe with the Brahmens, they affured me that the Nátacs were not hiftories, and abounded with fables; that they were extremely popular works, and confifted of converfations in profe and verfe, held before ancient Rájás in their public affemblies, on an infinite variety of subjects, and in various dialects of India: this definition gave me no very diftinct idea; but I concluded they were dialogues on moral or literary topicks; whilst other Europeans, whom I confulted, had understood from the natives that they were difcourfes on dancing, mufick, or poetry. At length a very fenfible Bráhmen, named Rádhácant, who had long been attentive to English manners, removed all my doubts, and gave me no lefs delight than furprise, by telling me that our nation had compofitions of the fame fort, which were publickly reprefented at Calcutta in the cold feafon, and bore the name, as he had been informed, of plays. Refolving at my leifure to read the best of them, I asked which of their Nátacs was VOL. IV. moft K most univerfally esteemed; and he anfwered without hesitation, Sacontala, fupporting his opinion, as ufual among the Pandits, by a couplet to this effect: "The ring of Sacontalá, in which the fourth act, and four ftanzas of that act, are eminently brilliant, difplays all the rich exuberance of Cálidáfa's genius." I foon procured a correct copy of it; and, affifted by my teacher Rámalóchan, began with translating it verbally into Latin, which bears fo great a refemblance to Sanferit, that it is more convenient than any modern language for a fcrupulous interlineary verfion: I then turned it word for word into English, and afterwards, without adding or fuppreffing any material fentence, difengaged it from the ftiffness of a foreign idiom, and prepared the faithful tranflation of the Indian drama, which I now prefent to the publick as a most pleafing and authentick picture of old Hindu manners, and one of the greatest curiofities that the literature of Afia has yet brought to light." We afterward receive fome further infight into the character of Cálidás: who flourished fo long ago as the reign of Vicramáditya, in the firft century before Chrift.' All the other works of our illuftrious poet, the Shakespeare of India, that have yet come to my knowledge, are a fecond play, in five acts, entitled Urvasí; an heroic poem, or rather a feries of poems in one book, on the Children of the Sun; another, with perfect unity of action, on the Birth of Cumára, god of war; two or three love tales in verfe; and an excellent little work on Sanfcrit Metre, precisely in the manner of Terentianus: but he is believed by fome to have revised the works of Válmic and Vyáfa, and to have corrected the perfect editions of them which are now current: this at leaft is admitted by all, that he ftands next in reputation to thofe venerable bards; and we must regret, that he has left only two Dramatick Poems, efpecially as the ftories in his Raghuvanía would have fupplied him with a number of excellent fubjects.Some of his contemporaries, and other Hindu poets even to our own times, have compofed fo many tragedies, comedies, farces, and mufical pieces, that the Indian theatre would fill as many volumes as that of any nation in ancient or modern Europe: all the Pandits affert that their plays are innumerable; and, on my first inquiries concerning them, I had notice of more than thirty, which they confider as the flower of their Nátacs, among which the Malignant Child, the Rape of Ufhá, the Taming of Durváfas, the Seizure of the Lock, Málati and Madhava, with five or fix dramas on the adventures of their incarnate gods, are the most admired after those of Cálidas. They are all in verfe, where the dialogue is elevated; and in profe, where it is familiar: the men of rank and learning are reprefented fpeaking pure Sanfcrit, and the women Prácrit, which is little more than the language of the Brahmens melted down by a delicate articulation to the foftnefs of Italian; while the low perfons of the drama fpeak the vulgar dialects of the feveral provinces which they are fuppofed to inhabit." The outline of this drama, which is divided into feven acts, is fimply as follows: Dufhmanta, Emperor of India, when hunt ing near a confecrated foreft, meets with Sacontalá; who, being the daughter of a king by a nymph of the lower heaven, is left by her parents under the care of the hermit, Canna. He becomes enamoured of her, and marries her: but being fuddenly called to his court, he leaves her in a state of pregnancy; giving her, at the fame time, a ring, with the name, Dushmanta, engraved on it. The manner of giving the ring. is afterward related by the King. • When I was coming from the holy foreft to the capital, my beloved, with tears in her eyes, thus addreffed me: "How long will the son of my lord keep me in his remembrance?"-Then, fixing this ring on her lovely finger, I thus answered: "Repeat each day one of the three fyllables engraved on this gem; and before thou haft fpelled the word Dufhmanta, one of my nobleft officers fhall attend thee, and conduct my darling to her palace." In the mean time, Sacontalá, by neglecting fome offices of hofpitality, expofed herself to the wrath of the angry Durváfas,' who uttered the following imprecation: "He on whom thou art meditating, on whom alone thy heart is now fixed, while thou neglecteft a pure gem of devotion who demands hofpitality, fhall forget thee, when thou feeft him next, as a man reftored to fobriety forgets the words which he uttered in a state of intoxication." His wrath being, however, in a little degree foftened by the intreaties of one of the damfels attending on Sacontalá, he confented that, though his word could not be recalled, the fpell which it had raised fhould be wholly removed, when her lord fhould fee his ring. The King not fending, according to his promife, Canna is induced by fome favourable omens, to convey his adopted daughter to the palace, in company with Gautami, an old female hermit, and two Brahmens. They are admitted into the King's prefence: but Dufhmanta, being under the influence of the fpell, denies all knowlege of his wife. Sacontalá recollecting what her companions had faid concerning the ring, offers to prefent it to him: but, alas! it was gone. This confirms the King in his fufpicions; and Sacontalá, as fhe retreats in tears, is fnatched away by a body of light in a female form. Soon after, the ring, which had fallen into a brook, is brought to the King, who inftantly recognizes his wife, and afflicts himself greatly for her lofs. He is, at length, in confequence of fupernatural affiftance, reftored to her, with the additional fatiffaction of finding her delivered of a fon, of whom it was predicted, that before he had paffed the ocean of mortal life, he fhould rule, unequalled in combat, this earth with feven peninfulas; and that, as he was then called Servademana, because he tamed even in childhood the fierceft animals, fo in his riper K 2 years, |