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of the term of the fellowship. Natives can investigate and write, if not suggest, regarding Native society-its intricacies and its miseries, -which it were vain for Englishmen to endeavour to do. We know several English authors, pretending to pourtray "manners of the Hindoos" and the like; but with all respect to the learning and shrewdness of our English writers, we must confess we have always laughed at the idea. Exceptions are confounded with examples, enforced superficialities with constitutional traits, and in various cases the task has been executed in the ridiculous spirit of that unsophisticated Marquis, who, after only a few months' residence in Russia, wrote more than one volume upon everything-the geography, topography, politics, statistics, ethics, sociology, &c. of the empire; proclaiming, with dramatic effect," that he saw nothing, but guessed everything"!

We are strong in our affirmation; but Englishmen will allow that as it is difficult for Frenchmen to understand the people of perfide Albion, so also is it difficult for Englishmen to understand their "volatile neighbours." To come yet closer, and more forcibly to illustrate the immense difficulty of foreigners (even

of the same descent) understanding the Natives accurately, an American writer mentions he was twenty-five years in Scotland, and thought he understood the Scotch; but on going into England, and residing there also twenty-five years, he felt convinced that he understood neither the Scotch nor the English! Need our appeal, then, to our educated Natives, to observe, study, and describe the state of Indian society, breaking faith with their English friends, require for its earnestness a better illustration?*

* A learned gentleman at Calcutta, a personal friend of Harrischander, supplies a gap connected with the deceased patriot in the literary line: he states that the late Baboo exerted himself in behalf of the poor and illiterate ryots of Bengal, not only by exposing the cruelties of their oppressors in the columns of the Hindoo Patriot, but spared no pains to write memorials for them to Government, and to organise means for procuring legal as, sistance to them in the conduct of cases, and for general advice on the subject. He even went the length of helping them with money from his own scanty pocket. This is undoubtedly patriotism of an uncommon sort in India; and while its display attracts ten times more admiration than it otherwise would, from the painful contrast in which our now well-to-do, vain, and half-literate older students, with but very few exceptions, stand on this island, in comparison with it, we regret that the zealous patriot did not devote the same exertions towards ameliorating the social position of the cultivators. That he has died doing good to the masses of Bengal, none will deny ; but that good was only temporary-such as relieved the ryots

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from being ground down by the cruelty and chicanery of the planter, into which state he has as much chance as before of again at some future time falling, and the effects of which will, we believe we may openly assert, though at the risk of offending some thin-skinned individual, die out. We mean no offence to the memory of one, whom, while living, we esteemed the most, and when dead regretted sincerely. We say that it was in his power to do permanent good to the cultivating masses in his immediate vicinity, but that he unfortunately missed his opportunity. May his name and his memory be an encouragement to others of his countrymen to carry out those exertions and that philanthropy which distinguished the political reformer in that line of genuine reform where they are so pre-eminently

required.

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CHAPTER IX.

THE LONGEST, BUT THE MOST IMPORTANT CHAPTER IN THE BOOK: REGENERATION OF INDIA.

Two theories for the amelioration of the people.-Which preferred.-Danger from the present hopeless condition of the people.-The Empires of the World.--Of the Cæsars, Baber, and Napoleon.-Uniqueness of British domination.-The present time pre-eminently fitted for undertaking the task of Popular Education in India.-Review of the History of Indian Education.-Its three epochs.--Government System of Education faulty.-Distinction between general and special education.-Every man, however low and grovelling, receives all life long some education or other.-In India there is in one sense no general education.-Percentage of boys that finish a complete course of general instruction.-A mournful question.-Necessity of rendering Colleges self-supporting.Grounds for viewing the measure as easy of accomplishment. -Percentage of boys receiving elementary education.—The state of this education.-Number of Schools in the Bombay Presidency. Statistics of Population in the different divisions of British India.-The educational requirements of each calculated in comparison with some of the States of Europe. With reference to Primary Schools.-With reference to Teachers.—Unfitness of the present Staff even in the highest English Seminary.-The number of Normal Colleges and of Inspectors required.--The people too poor to join the Schools. Their popular notions on Englishmen's leaving

India for their Mother Country.-Great misapprehension among Englishmen with reference to the wants of the people. -Advocacy of the German method of popular instruction.— Striking resemblance in the state of Germany and of India.— Our present system of education not essentially differing from the German, though so popularly taken.—-Mere Schools and School Training ineffectual to work any change among the people.-The French Colportage described.-Establishment of a Committee for the diffusion of knowledge advocated.—The present state of Prose and Poetry in the Vernacular.-The establishment of Clubs advocated.-What is our present national strength and vigour ?-A new order of thought and morality, as yet unknown to the world, evolved in India.-A Summary of our Scheme.

As yet we have only spoken of Baboo Harrischander and of his class; but incomplete would be any treatise on India, in which there is nothing said of the millions, helpless, hopeless, and ignorant, that inhabit its vast tracts. Baboo Harrischander fought for the ryot; why then not cast a glance on the poor tiller, and see if anything can be proposed for his amelioration? The really educated class of Young India form but the minority; so small, indeed, as to measure only a few drops of water in a long arm of the sea; and though the future enveloped in this minority may justify any long and exclusive dissertation, we have at the very outset promised to invite the reader to the ignorant and the lowest. It would be a long and arduous task to describe