band, a passionate lover of her children, the conserver of society, the true devotee in religion." The Obverse Zenana Women. This, however, is 992 less than half the truth. Beginning with the zenana life, we note the claim that "it has now become to India ladies a part and parcel of their creed. Modesty, in a word, is to them the very breath of their nostrils. To do away with it is a violation of one of the virtues of a woman.' But what of their virtual imprisonment, injurious to themselves and to their children? What of the ever-present consciousness of their sex and their fear of man? One consequence of such an emphasis is expressed in the words of the Indian writer: "Instead of promoting virtue, it has tended to make the imagination prurient." Think, too, of the narrow horizon of thought and activity of these prisoners without hope. One does not wonder at the oft-quoted statement of the well known traveler, Mrs. Bishop, when, to the deprivations already named, are added the heart burnings of polygamous households. "I have lived in zenanas," she writes, "and can speak from experience of what the lives of secluded women can be, the intellect so dwarfed that a woman of twenty or thirty is more like a child, while all the worst passions of human nature are developed and stimulated; jealousy, envy, murderous hate, intrigue running to such an extent that in some countries I have hardly ever been in a woman's house without being asked for drugs to disfigure the favorite wife, or take away her son's life. This request has been made of me nearly one hundred times. This is a natural product of a system that we ought to have subverted long ago." Early Marriage and Widowhood. Without speaking of the host of women who leave home to pander to the gods and godless men, one can not but think of the millions of Indian women who endure the sorrows incident 1 Jones, India's Problem, p. 151. Fuller, Wrongs of Indian Womanhood, p. 97. to child marriage. A girl may be betrothed as soon as born, though her second and real marriage may not occur until she is ten or more. Too often becoming a mother before she is mature enough to endure the strain, she goes through life a victim of brutal lust, it may be of a man several times her own age. There are two other things even worse than this. It may happen that no one is found to marry her, and as custom requires her to have a husband, she becomes, in Bengal at least, the wife of a professional bridegroom of the Brahman caste. He will marry any number of women and girls for a suitable fee, seeing his wives occasionally, or perhaps never after the wedding-day. The other greatly dreaded wrong is that of child widowhood, which, in multitudinous cases, is her lot, even though she may never have been married, her betrothed having died in boyhood. As in 1891 there were in India 22,700,000 widows, one realizes the flood of misery that overspreads the land. Everywhere are shorn, jewelless, starving outcasts, the ill-starred members of society, shunned by all except those base men for whom the word widow is synonymous with harlot. Those widows who have sons are an exception to others not so blessed. Woman's Common Lot. What the masses of Hindu women endure is indicated in Bishop Caldwell's Tinnevelly 'Missions. "If slavery means social degradation, Hindu women must be regarded as slaves; for not only are they denied equal rights with the men, but they are regarded as having no claim to any rights or feelings at all. The Hindu wife is not allowed to eat with her own husband; her duty is to wait upon her husband when he is eating and to eat what he has left. If they have any children, the boys eat with their father, and, after they have done, the girls eat with their mother. Nor is this custom among the lower classes only; it is the custom amongst every class of Hindus, in every part of India where I have been. If a party are going anywhere on a visit, the men always walk first, the women humbly follow; the wife never so far forgets her place as to walk side by side with her husband, much less arm in arm. Worse than all this is the circumstance that women are unable to read, and are not allowed to learn."" Burmese Women. One numerous class of women furnish an exception to the above statements, namely, those living in Burma. Mrs. Hart says of them: "While the Burmese man has, by the force of the combined influences of Buddhism and climate, become either an indolent, harmless monk, or an easy-going, amiable, pleasure-loving countryman, the Burmese woman, influenced in a far less degree by religion, untrammeled by convention, and gifted with freedom of action from her earliest youth, has developed into an individual of marked intelligence and strong charThe women are the traders of the country; with them large contracts are often made by government officials. They keep the stalls in the bazaars, and they aid their husbands in the sale of the paddy harvests. Denied education in the past, Burmese girls are now beginning to avail themselves eagerly of the government schools for women established by the English." acter. 992 5. Hindu Children. Patience is the one word which especially applies to the poorer children of India. From the days when, as babies, they lie alone for hours, tormented by flies and mosquitoes, but apparently contented in contemplating their dusky hands, until, prematurely old, they reach adolescence, they endure all sorts of hardness with scarcely a word of complaint. They are timid and usually respectful to their elders. The play instinct is not so fully developed in them as it is in the Occident. As for intellectual qualities, children learn rapidly if the memory only is called into play. When the reasoning 1 Murdoch, Indian Missionary Manual, pp. 91, 92. powers are involved, the children of the higher castes are naturally superior to those who receive no intellectual heritage from scholarly ancestors; hence the lowest castes are not so hopeful from the intellectual viewpoint as are the Brahmans. 6. Caste-Its Degeneracy. - The preceding chapter has suggested the historical origin of the social distinction known to the West by the Portuguese term, casta, or caste, and to the Hindus as jati, meaning race or class, or else as varna, color. The four clearly defined castes found in the Laws of Manu, namely, the Brahmans, Kshattriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras, are now not so distinct, and instead of four castes their number is legion. The Brahmans come nearest to being an exception to the rule, though even they are subdivided into nearly 2,000 classes, - and so probably are the Rajputs, who claim to be the lineal descendants of the Kshattriyas. As for the Vaisyas and Sudras, they are endlessly subdivided and the early distinctions have ceased to exist. The successors of the ancient Sudras are the most numerous by far, and when added to the Pariahs or outcastes, they represent about nine-tenths of the population. Definition and Rationale. - Indian caste of to-day is a hereditary institution that is at once social, industrial, religious, and, to some extent, racial in character. In the religious sense it would more properly be considered in the following chapter. The native view of caste is well set forth by Dr. Duff. "The great family of man, in the opinion of the Hindus, is made up of different genera and species, each as essentially distinct from the rest as one genus or species of birds, beasts, or fishes is from one another. However closely different birds, beasts, and fishes may resemble each other in outward appearance and general characteristics, each kind will keep itself distinct by its food, its habits, and its sympathies; will associate and congenialize with those of its own kind, in preference and to the exclusion of others. It would be monstrous if the members of one genus would cease to resemble and unite with the members of its own genus and mix with and adopt the distinguishing marks and habits of another. It would be strange indeed were the lion to graze like an ox, or the ox to slay its prey like the lion. The special capabilities also of service to be derived from any particular genus or species of animals cannot be transferred to another. A sheep or an ox, for example, cannot be made to answer the same purpose as a horse. It would be unnatural to expect that an ox should carry a rider as swiftly as a horse can, and wrong to make the attempt to train him for the race-course. -- Essential Factors. "Ideas somewhat akin to these seem to form the groundwork in the Hindu mind of the prevalent notions of caste, and may help to account for the fact that the points considered most essential in caste are food and its preparation, intermarriage within the same caste only, hereditary occupation, and a peculiar sympathy with the whole caste, which, taking the form of initiativeness, leads an individual Hindu to follow the example of his caste, just as a sheep or a wild pigeon follows the example of the flock. These ideas also may so far explain the ground of the local variations observable in the custom and usages of the same caste. In one place a Hindu will consent to do what in another he would peremptorily refuse to do, simply because in the former he is countenanced by the example of his brethren, and not in the latter; just as a flock of sheep or pigeons may, from accidental causes, somewhat vary its habits or movements in different localities."" Its Advantages. nected with caste. There are undoubtedly benefits conMissionaries have noted its value in the matter of securing the economic advantages of division of labor and the protection coming from the larger 'Duff, Letters on the Indian Rebellion, pp. 324.326. |