BIBLIOTHECA INDICA; A انه COLLECTION OF PUBLISHED UNDER THE PATRONAGE OF THE Hon. Court of Directors of the East India Company AND THE SUPERINTENDENCE OF THE ASIATIC SOCIETY OF BENGAL. THE VASAVADATTA, A ROMANCE BY SUBANDHU; ACCOMPANIED BY S'IVARAMA TRIPATHIN'S PERPE- EDITED BY FITZEDWARD HALL, M. A. CALCUTTA : PRINTED BY C. B. LEWIS, BAPTIST MISSION PRESS. 1859. EDITOR'S PREFACE. Kátyáyana, the grammarian, is the earliest author known, by whom a tale of Vásavadattᆠappears to be indicated. To discourage the surmise that Subandhu‡ was beholden to this or to any other ancient composition, there is, however, the argument of entire silence, in all Hindu literature yet discovered, that he was thus indebted. The object which he proposed to himself was, it is justly inferred, of a nature to render choice of plot a matter of very secondary import. His aim, as slight observation may suffice to convince, is the illustration of certain powers of the Sanskrit; and this through the medium of such imagery as was, in his time, counted most tasteful, and such * By way of exemplification, while annotating Páṇini: 2d áhnika, 4th adhyaya, 3d páda. Works are there instanced in connexion with the names of Vasavadattá, Sumanottará, and Bhaimarathí. See Dr. Böhtlingk's edition of the Ashṭádhyayí, Vol. II., p. 189. † Vásavadattá, as denominating a woman, is likely, from its etymology, to be very ancient; and it occurs in books of the Bauddhas, no less than in those of the Bráhmans. See Burnouf's Introduction à l'Histoire du Buddhisme Indien, Vol. I., p. 146. Subandhu, as an appellation, is of great antiquity. Professor Wilson says, of the sacred character so called, who is mentioned in the eighth act of the Mrichchhakatiké drama, that he "has not been identified." Select Specimens of the Theatre of the Hindus, 2d edition, Vol. I., p. 136. According to the Sarvánukrama of the Rig-veda, Bandhu, Subandhu, Srutabandhu, and Viprabandhu, sons of Gopayana or Lopáyana, were joint authors of a hymn, the twenty-fourth of the fifth mandala. allusions to Indian lore as were then especially held in esteem. At the least, it is, accordingly, just as probable that he devised, as that he borrowed, the hungry array of incidents which he has employed as a vehicle for the execution of his purpose. The romance of Vásavadattá referred to in the Málatí-mádhava,* as, in like manner, that found detailed in the Kathá-sarit * Scanty as is the clue which Bhavabhuti affords to the fiction which he intends, still his specification of Sanjaya as a leading actor in it is enough to evince that the poet had in mind some narrative now no longer familiar. "It seems probable," says Professor Wilson, in solution, "that the story of Vásavadattá underwent some alterations subsequent to the time of Bhavabhuti, and [that] the original form is lost." Select Specimens, &c., 2d edition, Vol. II., p. 35. Yet the Professor, elucidating the mention, in the Megha-dúta, of " the story of Udayana," adopts, unhesitatingly, the explanation given by the commentators; they relating, as the tale hinted at, one in which Sanjaya figures as rival of Vasavadattá's lover. Cloud-messenger, 2d edition, p. 30. For this confident procedure on the part of the expositors, their own authority is all that we have. No doubt they speak of a fiction of which they had some knowledge: but, as Professor Wilson has not made out which "form" of the Vásavadattá was the older, nor that this was not the title of several independent romances; so the annotators, above spoken of, have left it undetermined whether there may not have been a plurality of Udayanas, and whether the one commemorated in the Megha-dúta may not have been unknown to them. There is, consequently, very feeble warrant for the opinion, to which Professor Wilson so easily assents, that the Megha-dúta points to any story concerned with a Vásavadattá; an opinion which, nevertheless, he iterates and reiterates. "The loves of Vatsa * * * and Vásavadattá * * * are alluded to in the Megha-dúta, and are narrated in the Brihat-kathá [read Kathá-sarit-ságara] of Somadeva." Select Specimens, &c., 2d edition, vol. II., p. 257. See also, his edition of the Das'a-kumára-charita, p. 55. "The story of Vásavadattá seems to have been very popular in the middle ages. It is given in the Sarit-ságara [Kathá-sarit-ságara], and is alluded to in the Megha-dúta and in the Málatí and Mádhava," Id., ibid., p. 100. "Mr. Colebrooke," says the Professor, “has stated that the allusion by Bhavabhuti was unsupported by other authority; not having, perhaps, súgara,-and which had previously been dramatized in the Rat p. 30. In observing that "no other trace has been yet found of the story to which Bhavabhúti has alluded," it may much rather be conjectured that Colebrooke, so far from being inobservant, while fully aware of what Professor Wilson assumes, in suite, to be an allusion, simply means to signify, in his reticent manner, a distrust, in this particular instance, of Indian criticism: and here, most assuredly, it is sufficiently inconclusive. See Miscell. Essays, Vol. II., p. 135. It is a little singular that Professor Wilson should have published what occurs regarding Udayana, in his second edition of the Cloud-messenger, and, above all, the stricture, above cited, on the most discursive of Sanskrit scholars, and the most exact for his range of reading, after he had written as follows: "in consequence of misunderstanding the exact purport of Mr. Colebrooke's remark, I considered him to have overlooked an allusion to the story of Udayana, in the Megha-dúta; which, however, is merely general, and therefore throws no light on the passage." Select Specimens, &c., 2d edition, Vol. II., p. 35. The subjoined verses are cited as showing, incidentally, by a specimen on which European editors of the Megha-dúta have not yet happened, to what extent this poem has been alloyed by augmentations utterly unworthy of its author. By this unsightly excrescence evidence is more especially supplied, that at least one of the poetasters by whom it has been sophisticated understands, by the Vásavadattá supposed to be intimated in the mention of Udayana, a person who, as the interpolator speaks of her, differs from any that we have hitherto heard of, unless it be, possibly, the queen in the Ratnávalí. According to this addition, the poet, referring to Ujjayiní, is made to say: Here the Prince of Vatsa possessed himself of the beloved daughter of Pradyota.' In the Katha-sarit-sagara, the Vásavadattá of Ujjayiní is daughter of Chandamahásena; while, in the Ratnávali, Vásavadattá is daughter of Pradyota, and the residence of her father is not noticed. The Kathá-sarit-ságara makes Pradyota king of Magadhá, and father of Padmávatí, Vatsa's second wife: for he marries twice. Select Specimens, &c., 2d edition, Vol. II., p. 269; and Dr. Brockhaus's Kathá-sarit-ságara, Vol. I., P. 131 of the Sanskrit, or p. 44 of the German translation, for a correction of Professor Wilson's "Chandasena." हारांस्तारांस्तरलगुटिकान् कोटिशः शङ्खशक्तीः |