A HINDOO WIDOW ON FEMALE EDUCATION IN INDIA.

Mataura Ensign, Volume V, Issue 234, 2 March 1883, Page 6

A HINDOO WIDOW ON FEMALE EDUCATION IN INDIA.

TELEGRAPmNGon Sunday, the Calcutta correspondent of an English Journal says: Pundita Romabai, the learned Hindoo lady who has consecrated her life to the noble work of promoting female education in India, has aroused profound interest by a course of lectures which she h delivering in Bombay. She is a widow aged barely 25, and renowned among the natives for her knowledge of Sanskrit, and for complete emancipation from all narrow and debasing superstitions. There was a very large attendance of Hindoo and Parsee ladies at her first lecture, and the hall was crowded to excess. The lecturer, who was modestly attired in a simple white dress, spoke with perfect fluency and complete self-possession. She dwelt at great length upon the benefits arising from education, and pressed upon the members of her sex the importance of cultivating and embellishing their minds i£ they wished to advance with the progress of the times. It was a fact patent to them all that education had been making rapid strides among the male population of India ; and the young women who were destined to join themselves in matrimonial bonds with youths of advancing views and culture, should keep pace with them. Happiness was the result of peace and harmony, and, again, peace and harmony prevailed where the thoughts and actions of two persons were directed towards the same ends. In order, therefore, to secure domestic happiness, which was in itself a great blessing, it was the duty of every female to conform her habits and ways of thinking to that of her partner. To acquire this uniformity of ideas and actions it was necessary that one should receive a certain amount of liberal education. The system of education as now imparted to girls was defective in its principles. The girls should by means of education be taught to think and act in the same way as the other sex did. At present the males received education of a liberal character, which the females never did, and hence it was that the ways of the one were never at one with those of the other. It was like the case of two men tied together, one of whom had a tendency to go ahead and the other to lag behind — causing at last a stoppage of all motion. In one way or another, women were capable of accomplishing extraordinary feats of valour ; in illustration of which the lecturer gave several instances from the " Mahabharata " and other ancient books of history. If women, like men, were capable of fighting on the field of battle they were also fit to be educated like them. As to what women do on the field of battle, the lecturer cited the instance of Shiliabai, the Queen of Benares, who conquered her enemy as if it were by word of mouth. She sent him a challenge on the battlefield, Btating that if she were defeated people would only say that she was a woman, and it was no wonder that she was overcome ; but should he be defeated every one would look upon him with scorn and contempt. The Chairman proposed a vote of thanks to the lecturer, and it was carried with acclamation. A native newspaper commenting on the results of her lecture, writes as follows : — " Her example has had something of an electric effect on the large number of native lauies that have attended her lectures. Native ladies are unusually bashful, and although a very large number of them attended her first lecture, very few, we believe, came prepared to follow the example of the learned lady they went to hear ; but after the Pundita had finished, the ladies present were asked to express their thoughts upon the subject she had dwelt upon. This request was made with some doubt as to its being acted upon. The native ladies were hardly expected to take up the hint, and for some minutes after it was made they looked at one another as if they could not understand what it meant. But all of a sudden the ice of reserve was broken, and one of the ladies present gathered courage and stood up to have her say ; and she said it with a coolness which was certainly commendable. She was followed by another lady, and then a good many rose, one after another, as if the influence of the learned lecturer had worked powerfully among those present. The fair speakers acquitted themselves admirably. Perhaps the thoughts they expressed were crude, but the manner in which they were expressed was more than encouraging. One lady in admiration of the Pundita called her the native ladies' advocate (Vakeel). Another lady was so enthusiastic in. her praise of the Pundita as to tell the audience that she was, in the speaker's opinion, specially created by Providence for the salvation of the women of India. A third lady called upon those of her sex present there to judge, from the Pundita's example, what a woman could be and could accomplish. So marked and immediate was the change of Pundita Romabai's appearance before the public, that nearly half-a«* dozen of those present vied eagerly with one another for the privilege of gracefully speaking to the audience in praise of their able and learned sister. Even the most hopeful of women's advocates among us were hardly prepared for this singular but most deiightfol spectacle,"