( lxxiv. ) time. In Pataliputra, the Mitras lived for some ten generations, after which all trace of them is lost again, until Gadhipura or Kanauj looms before the eye of history. When Europe was enveloped in the darkness of the middle ages, this town was of such opulence and magnificence as to boast of possessing a thousand shops for the sale of betel leaves alone, the Pan, which is chewd as a luxury all over the East. 4. MITTRAS IN BENGAL. We now tread upon more tangible ground, for we have now come down to the year 868 A.D., memorable in the history of Bengal, being the year when king Adisur brought the five Brahmans and the five Kayasthas from Kanauj, who are the ancestors of all the members of these two castes now inhabiting this province, and in whom is confined almost all the intellect and all the culture the Bengalis are credited with. The ancestor of Bihari Lal Mitra, as well as of all the Mitras of Bengal who came from Kanauj about eleven hundred years ago, bore the name of Kali Mitra. He settled down in Gaur, the capital of the provinee, then in the zenith of its glory. After some generations, probably after the destruction of Gaur by malaria, the family removed to Barisa o a village in the south of Calcutta, and then again to Bali on the opposite side of the river.
