atin classics, in French and Spanish
literature, but contained little to amuse a child. Led by some happy
fortune, in turning over a pile of the "Monthly Anthology" his eye was
attracted by the title of a play, "Sacontala,[30] or the Fatal Ring; an
Indian Drama, translated from the original Sanskrit and Pracrit. Calcutta,
1789," and reprinted in the Anthology in successive numbers. Gathering
them together, the boy took them into a great chestnut-tree, amid the
limbs of which he had constructed a study, and there, in the warm,
fragrant shade, read hour after hour this bewitching story. The tale was
suited to the day and the scene,--filled with images of tender girls and
religious sages, who lived amid a tropical abundance of flowers and
fruits; so blending the beauty of nature with the charm of love. Nature
becomes in it alive, and is interpenetrated with human sentiments.
Sakuntala loves the flowers as sisters; the Kesara-tree beckons to her
with its waving blossoms, and clings to her in affection as she bends over
it. The jasmine, the wife of the mango-tree, embraces her lord, who leans
down to protect his blooming bride, "the moonlight of the grove." The holy
hermits defend the timid fawn from the hunters, and the birds, grown tame
in their peaceful solitudes, look tranquilly on the intruder. The demons
occasionally disturb the sacrificial rites, but, like well-educated
demons, retire at once, as soon as the protecting Raja enters the sacred
grove. All breathes of love, gentle and generous sentiment, and quiet joys
in the bosom of a luxuriant and beautiful summer land. Thus, in this poem,
written a hundred years before Christ, we find that romantic view of
nature, unknown to the Greeks and Romans, and first appearing in our own
time in such writers as Rousseau, Goethe, and Byron.

He who translated this poem into a European language, and communicated it
to modern readers, was Sir William Jones, one of the few first-class
scholars whom the world has produced. In him was joined a marvellous gift
of language with a love for truth and beauty, which detected by an
infallible instinct what was worth knowing, in the mighty maze of Oriental
literature. He had also the rare good fortune of being the first to
discover this domain of literature in Asia, unknown to the West till he
came to reveal it. The vast realm of Hindoo, Chinese, and Persian genius
was as much a new continent to Europe, when discovered by Sir William
Jones, a