valuable help and assistance in this matter, and I gratefully
acknowledge, the benefit I have derived from his advice and
suggestions. After considerable trouble and anxiety, and after
rendering several books in different English metres, I felt convinced
that the one finally adopted was a nearer approach to the Sanscrit
_Sloka_ than any other familiar English metre known to me.

I have recited a verse in this English metre and a _Sloka_ in
presence of listeners who have a better ear for music than myself,
and they have marked the close resemblance. I quote a few lines from
the Sanscrit showing varieties of the _Sloka_ metre, and comparing
them with the scheme of the English metre selected.

Esha Kuntishutah sriman | esha madhyama Pandavah
Esha putro Mahendrasya | Kurunam esha rakshita

--Maha-bharata, i. 5357.

Yet I doubt not through the ages | one increasing purpose runs
And the thoughts of men are widened | with the process of the suns

--Locksley Hall.

Malancha samupadaya | kanchanim samalamkritam
Avatirna tato rangam | Draupadi Bharatarshabha

--Maha-bharata, i. 6974.

Visions of the days departed | shadowy phantoms filled my brain;
Those who live in history only | seemed to walk the earth again

--Belfry of Bruges.

Asuryam iva suryena | nirvatam iva vayuna
Bhasitam hladitanchaiva | Krishnenedam sado hi nah

--Maha-bharata, ii. 1334.

Quaint old town of toil and traffic | quaint old town of art and song,
Memories haunt thy pointed gables, | like the rooks that round thee throng.

--Nueremberg.

Ha Pando ha maharaja | kvasi kim samupekshase
Putran vivasyatah sadhun | aribhir dyutanirjitan

--Maha-bharata, ii. 2610.

In her ear he whispers gaily, | If my heart by signs can tell,
Maiden I have watched thee daily, | And I think thou lov'st me well

--Lord of Burleigh.

It would be too much to assume that even with the help of this
similarity in metres, I have been able to transfer into my English
that sweep and majesty of verse which is the charm of Sanscrit, and
which often sustains and elevates the simplest narration and the
plainest ideas. Without the support of those sustaining wings, my
poor narration must often plod through the dust; and I can only ask
for the indulgence of the reader, which every translator of poetry
from a foreign language can with reason ask, if the story as told
in the translation is sometimes but a plain, simple, and homely
narrative. For any artistic decoration