India. It may also be hoped that the same news may lead the Committee of Public Instruction in Turkey to establish a chair for Hindustani in Istamboul.
The Shah of Persia, when he visited the Queen in 1889, was no less surprised to see the Queen learn Hindustani than his Imperial cousin at the Golden Horn. The accompanying remarks of the Queen in her Hindustani diary respecting His Majesty's visit will doubtless prove very interesting to the readers of this Magazine.
Some description of the Hindustani language will not be out of place here. Of all the modern languages spoken in India—I might say in Asia—the Urdu language stands pre-eminently distinguished for the delicacy and sweetness of its expressions. The Moghul emperors stood in need of a common language for their court and camp, which were composed of representatives of various nationalities, and thus a mixture of Persian, Arabic, and Sanskrit gave rise to a new and beautiful language.
Nowhere have the Moghuls rendered a more lasting service to India than in giving her the Urdu language, which may fairly be said to be the lingua Franca of India. It has in it the sweetness of Persian, the grandeur of Sanskrit, and the sublimity of Arabic. The language has, during one hundred years' connection with England, borrowed many political and scientific expressions of the West, and recent translations of eminent foreign works have enriched its vocabulary to an enormous extent. If the language continues to make the present progress in the course of the next hundred years, it will perhaps be the richest language in Asia.
Time was when Mohammedan scholars who always used Arabic or Persian thought it infra dig. to use Hindustani as a means of intercommunication, just as much as British scholars thought of using English in place of Latin. But of late the feeling has undergone a complete change simultaneously with the growth of the language. The rich and healthy literature that comes out every day from the pen of the rising generation is simply amazing. Newspapers and periodicals are fast over-running he length and breadth of the country. We have always had beautiful works in poetry and fiction, but modern books on these subjects indicate a marked revolution in the ideas of the writers; while both the manner in which they are written and the matter which they contain are extremely praiseworthy.
The rapidity and ease with which the Queen is mastering the language is very remarkable. Among her many enviable qualities, there are two which the Queen possesses in an eminent degree. These are strict regularity and firm determination. Both these qualities have never been more conspicuously displayed by her than in the acquisition of her new language. It is generally known that no frost, no wind, no rain will ever prevent her from her daily drives—I may say, no pressure of work, no anxiety, no sorrow keeps her from her linguistic work. Every day at the appointed hour the Queen is busy with her Hindustani. Even during the hours of most poignant pain and bewildering grief, enough to upset the daily routine of ordinary minds, the Queen did not fail to write her Hindustani diary at the usual time. The accompanying remarks of Her Majesty on the death of the Duke of Clarence in that diary will be read with much interest and sympathy by her loyal subjects.
The diary—which I had the privilege of seeing, among many other interesting things at Balmoral—is highly instructive, and I am sure the readers will be very grateful to Her Majesty for graciously permitting us to publish with this article fac-simile copies of a leaf or two out of the same for the benefit of the literary public.
I have said above that the Queen's studies have reacted in the most sympathetic manner in the East. The people of India may well expect that they will give new impetus to Oriental learning in this country. For the first time in the history of Europe a Sovereign of a great Power has devoted herself seriously to the literature of the Orient. The fact is noteworthy, because it marks an important epoch in the history of the reunion of the East and West. Whoever writes the future history of the rise and progress of Oriental literature in Europe, will be bound to chronicle the self-sacrificing devotion and gracious literary patronage of the illustrious Empress of India.
Forty years ago, when "Albert the Good," with the true insight of a statesman and a philosopher, nobly advocated the spread of Oriental learning in this country, little did he dream that his own Royal Consort would one day declare herself an Oriental student, and thus give a practical shape to his laudable advocacy. Had he been alive to-day we should have found in him, not only the strongest supporter of the languages of the East, but also an Orientalist himself.
Doubtless it is that he should have encouraged Oriental learning among the
