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The recovery of Bilhana's Vikramánkadevacharita, or adventures of King Vikramaditya-Tribhuwanamalla of Kalyana[१] furnishes the second specimen of a class of compositions, which though, probably, once numerous, seemed, until a few years ago, almost extinct. Like the S'riharshacharita, the Life of S'riharsha or Harshavardhana of Thanesar by Bánabhatta, Bilhana's poem is a panegyric in honour of his patron and protector. Considering that, with the exception of a certain number of religious and devotional works, the bulk of Sanskrit poetry proceeds from poets and Pandits, who lived under the protection of princes, it might be expected, that their gratitude would have secured to the Sankritist of these later days numerous works recording the lives and deeds of their patrons. But, curiously enough, lives of famous princes, like Vikrama, Bhoja and Kumarapala, written by authors who lived centuries after them have been known long before Dr. Fitz Edward Hall made the find of the Harshacharita. Since then fourteen years have elapsed before a second work of the kind has turned up. The reason for the scarcity of such works is, I believe, the fact that the Pandits have a greater liking for the wonderful legends of the heroic age and for the no less marvellous stories of those kings whom, for one reason or another, they have lifted out of the sphere of matter-of-fact history and transferred to the regions of fiction. For the Pandit Rama, Arjuna, and Nala are as much historical persons as S'ivaji or Baji Rao Peshva, only they
- ↑ See Report on the search for Sanskrit MSS. 1878-4.
