History of Bengali Language and Literature c10.46

c10.46

couplets like a Pandit, to serve as texts for the theological matter introduced in his book. The Moslem poet is profuse in his eulogies of Çiva the Hindu God, and all through the work writes in the spirit and strain of a devout Hindu. Curiously enough his work has been preserved in Chittagong by Mahomedan readers. The manuscripts of Padmāvati hitherto obtained, all belong to the border-lands of Ārācān in the back-woods of Chittagong, copied in Persian characters and preserved by the rural Mahomedan folk of those localities. No Hindu has ever yet cared to read them. This goes to prove how far the taste of the Mahomedans was imbued with Hindu culture. This book, that we should have thought, could be interesting only to Hindu readers, on account of its lengthy disquisitions on theology and Sanskrit rhetoric, has been strangely preserved, ever since Aurungjeb's time, by Moslems, for whom it could apparently have no attraction, nay to whom it might even seem positively repellent. From the time of Māgana Thākura the Mahomedan minister, till the time of Shaik Hāmidullā of Chittagong who published it in 1893—covering a period of nearly 250 years, this book was copied, read, and admired by the Mahomedans of Chittagong exclusively. What surprises us most is the interest taken by the rustic folk in its high-flown Sanskritic Bengali. The Province of Chittagong must have been once a nucleus of Sanskrit-learning to have disseminated so deep a liking for the classic tongue of the Hindus among the lowest strata of society, and specially amongst Mahomedans who might have been expected to have the least aptitude for this.