sense of rude health is infinitely to be preferred to a city such as
Calcutta with its artificiality and disease and in a style of bold
simplifications, he has constantly celebrated the natural vigour and
inherent dignity of simple unsophisticated men.

Such pictures stress a comparatively unimportant side of Krishna's
character and it is rather in the paintings of George Keyt that Krishna
the lover is proudly portrayed. Born in Ceylon of mixed ancestry, Keyt
has, for many years, been acutely responsive to Indian poetry. In 1947,
he published the translation of the _Gita Govinda,_ excerpts from which
have been quoted in the text, and throughout his career his work has been
distinguished by a poet's delight in feminine form and sensuous rapture.
To Keyt such a delight is a vital component of adult minds and in the
romance of Radha and Krishna he found a subject subtly expressive of his
own most intimate beliefs. His paintings and line-drawings of Radha,
Krishna and the cowgirls--at once modern yet vitally Indian in
spirit--have the same qualities as those in the _Gita Govinda_.[128] Radha
and Krishna are shown luxuriating in each other's elegance, a certain
ineffable tenderness characterizing their gestures and movements. Their
love is gentle rather than brusque, an air of glamorous wonder broods
above them and we meet once more that blend of romantic sensuality and
loving innocence which is perhaps the chief Indian contribution to
cultured living. It is this quality which gives to Indian paintings of
Krishna and his loves their incomparable fervour, and makes them enduring
expressions of Indian religion.

[Footnote 66: Plates 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13-17, 21 and 36.]

[Footnote 67: M.R. Mazumdar, 'The Gujarati School of Painting,' _Journal of
the Indian Society of Oriental Art_, 1942, Vol. X, plates 3 and 4.]