composition [3]. But it is not in India alone that the '[S']akoontalá' is
known and admired. Its excellence is now recognized in every
literary circle throughout the continent of Europe; and its beauties,
if not yet universally known and appreciated, are at least
acknowledged by many learned men in every country of the civilized
world. The four well-known lines of Goethe, so often quoted in
relation to the Indian drama, may here be repeated:

'Willst du die Blüthe des frühen, die Früchte des
späteren Jahres,
Willst du was reizt und entzückt, willst du was sättigt
und nährt,
Willst du den Himmel, die Erde, mit einem Namen
begreifen:
Nenn' ich, [S']akoontalá, Dich, und so ist Alles gesagt.'

'Would'st thou the young year's blossoms and the fruits
of its decline,
And all by which the soul is charmed, enraptured,
feasted, fed?
Would'st thou the Earth and Heaven itself in one sole
name combine?
I name thee, O [S']akoontalá! and all at once is said.'

_E.B. Eastwick_.

Augustus William von Schlegel, in his first Lecture on Dramatic
Literature, says: 'Among the Indians, the people from whom perhaps all
the cultivation of the human race has been derived, plays were known
long before they could have experienced any foreign influence. It has