society it is the surgeons who are prospering; the lathials are in a sad plight. Not that there is a dearth of lathials in the literary society today. Unfortunately there have been a little too many of them now, but their lathis are moth-eaten, and their arms weak, of course. Their lathis are but burdens to them now; and lacking the necessary education they often miss the mark. No doubt they succeed in making people laugh even today, but they themsleves are the objects of that laughter. Iswar Gupta and Dinabandhu were not lathials of this brand. They wielded lathis which were made of stout, seasoned bamboo; their arms were full of uncommon strength, and their education was many-sided.
Creative art is the chief virtue of an artist. Iswar Gupta lacked this art, but Dinabandhu possessed it in a large measure. Jaladhar, Jagadamba, Nimchand Dutt and such other creations of his are glowing examples of this. But Dinabandhu did not have much control over the subtle, the soft, the sweet, the naive, the pathetic and the placid. His Lilavati, Malati, Kamini, Sorindhri, Sarala and others are not much in favour with the connoiseur. His Binayak, Ramanimohan, Arabinda and Lalitmohan do not appeal to us much. But the broad, the irregular, the incoherent and the confused are at his very bidding. Like ghosts rushing at the sorcerer's call, they come up in an array the moment Dinabandhu conjures them.
One is surprised to think of the materials out of which Dinabandhu made these creations. His many-sided knowledge of the Bengali society is amazing. A writer who knows all about the daily life of a Bengali is no longer to be found. In this respect, the present-day writers of Bengal are in a very sad plight. Many of them have the right education for writing, and have no doubt the ability to write; only they do not know that thing which, if they knew it, would have brought them success. Many of them love their country and write for the good of the country only without knowing much about her. With a good many of them, knowledge of the country means the knowledge of their own class, in the city of Calcutta. True, some of them have perhaps gone round a few villages and a few towns, but it is the roads and the gardens and the markets they have seen, and never have they been amongst the people. Whatever knowledge they may claim about the
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