rode up to a house which evidently belonged to a person of property, where they hoped to procure some food. The owner was from home, but his wife, as soon as she knew their errand, though probably she had never before seen an European, received them with the greatest courtesy. Of course they could not be admitted within the house, but she invited them to rest themselves under a tree, while some refreshment should be prepared for them, and they were soon supplied with the best the house afforded, the mistress attending on them to see that they wanted nothing. When they had finished this welcome meal, they rose to take leave, and cordially thanking her for the reception she had given to such entire strangers, begged her to accept some remuneration. This she steadily refused, and expressed her pleasure at having had the opportunity of rendering them this slight service, adding in a strain truly Oriental, “I am at a loss to conceive what act of virtue I can have performed in a previous state of existence, that can have entitled me to so great an honour in this present life!"

Do you think the most finished European courtier could vie with this untaught heathen woman, in the art of complimenting?

I remain,

Yours affectionately,

S. T.

THE custom of early marriages, and still earlier betrothments, is a source of much evil and misery to the female population throughout India. When a girl is eight or nine years old, and sometimes much sooner, she is betrothed to a boy a few years older

and

than herself, whom perhaps she has never seen; from that time she is considered as his wife. At the age of thirteen or fourteen she is married, and henceforth becomes little more than a domestic slave. "She may not walk with her husband, but behind him; she may not eat with, but after him, and of what he leaves; she ought not to sleep till he is asleep, nor to remain asleep when he is awake, and if she is sitting when he comes in, she must rise, She should have no god on earth but her husband-him she should worship while he lives, and if he dies she is doomed to perpetual widowhood."* This doom is hers, even if the young man dies between the betrothment and the marriage; a black cord is fastened round her neck never to be removed, and the poor child is for ever shut out from scenes of gladness. The sports of childhood are denied her, she must never again be present at any season of rejoicing, she is treated as an inferior by her own family, must wear the coarsest garments, and eat but once a day of the coarsest food. Thus neglected and despised, with no interest in this life, and no hope for the future, it is no wonder that these poor girls often throw off all restraint, and abandon themselves to open sin.

The state of the Shânar women in Tinnevelly is

* Among other bonds from which Baboo Dwargan auth Tagore, (of Calcutta), has endeavoured to free his countrymen, this of perpetual widowhood is one; and he is still aiming at it.

not quite so bad as in most other parts of India, they are generally industrious and contented, faithful to their husbands, and fond of their children; but accustomed as they are from childhood to the horrid scenes of the Pei-arâdanai, their minds are degraded, and their general moral principle extremely low. Mr. Blackman and Mr. Schaffter have both assured me, that those who by living long and familiarly among the natives, have become well acquainted with the evils of a heathen education and of the early intercourse with heathens, to which even the children of Christians are subjected, can alone duly estimate the blessing of a truly pious well-educated mother; and it is this that makes female education of such great importance to a mission.

The subject had from the first been a source of anxiety to the Missionaries in Tinnevelly, but the usual prejudices against it prevented them from being able to take any steps; till in the early part of 1823, they were agreeably surprised by a boy in the school at Palamcottah begging for a spelling-book for his sister, whom he was teaching to read, and who already knew some of her letters. Encouraged by this, and two or three similar requests, a girls' school was established in the mission compound, and placed under the care of Mrs. Schnarré. You may imagine with what thankfulness the Missionaries looked on the thirty pleasant happy faces that were assembled

there, and rejoiced to think that these poor girls whose only instruction hitherto had been to keep caste, to make salaam, and to deceive; and whose chief encouragement had been to hear their mothers boast of the clever falsehoods they could tell, were now listening to the words of eternal truth, and learning not merely their duty in this life, but the way of everlasting salvation. Since that time, female education has slowly spread, and several schools have been established in the different districts.

I shall first tell you of those in which the girls are entirely taken into the mission compound, and are fed and clothed at the expense of Christian friends, and which for the sake of distinction I shall call

compound schools." I shall be able to give you a better idea of the subject, if I confine myself to the schools in one particular district; and as I have had the opportunity of knowing more about those of Sâtankullum than any other, I shall select these as a specimen of the rest.

When Mr. and Mrs. Blackman went to Tinnevelly, in January, 1836, they resided at first at Palamcottah, and Mrs. Blackman took part with Mrs. Pettitt in the care of the girls' school there. At the end of a year, they removed to Sâtankullum, and Mrs. Blackman took with her seven of the girls, with whom she began a similar school in her new abode, and soon increased her number to thirty-five.