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with the approval of lovers of literature like the Hon. Mr. James Gibbs, Messrs. Martin Wood, William Wordsworth, Herbert Birdwood, Edward Candy, Chester Macnagten and others. To the credit of my Parsi and Hindu brethren I may say that in a few months we had a liberal supply of money. We could easily meet the printing and binding charges at any rate. Confidence was now restored, and work was resumed with renewed interest.
But soon after we began to cry out against the all-but-hopeless task of rendering the Shastri-Bawa's transcendant thoughts into such a meagre vernacular as Gujarati. Both translators were about equally learned ! Very often, owing to his luminous expression, we could understand the author's meaning; but whence to bring the power, without experience, to clothe his thoughts in suitable vernacular? We had no such command of language. We could ourselves understand his thoughts--but we found it extremely difficult to lead these thoughts through such language as would strike the readerof ordinary intelligence--at the very first perusal. We have often had to pass two and three hours in brown study in rendering one word. If we entered into the verbiage of Dictionaries, we often lost our way. Instead of giving a meaning to words, they often seemed to make words more unmeaning. For one word a Dictiorary would say:-" It is & sort of flower". Another word it would define as "a kind of fruit;" for a third word it would offer a worthless explanation two feet long. Most of the more difficult words would be conspicuous by their absence. What to do now? But before one trouble was over, we had to confront another. We needed a knowledge of the Shastras in translating-of the Shastra (Science) of Religion and the Shastra of Language. . In this trouble I thought of my best friend, Mansukhram Suryaram Tripathi. This enlightened Vedantin was my finaláshrama (asylum.) In him I found rest from my distrac
Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
