writer obtained copies of this and several others of much value, which will appear in these pages.
My readers have, therefore, before them a faithful picture of a Hindoo lady of the highest rank, as she appears in her Zenana home, under the best circumstances, having made herself as attractive as silk, and muslin, and cashmere cloth, and a profusion of jewelry, can render her. In the jewel on the thumb of the left hand there is inserted a small looking-glass, of which the fair lady makes good use. The usual gold ring, strung with pearls, is in her nose, lying against her left cheek; and her forehead, ears, arms, fingers, ankles, and toes are crowded with jewelry and tinkling ornaments, the sounds of which proclaim her presence and approach always.
The wood-cut does no justice to her warm olive color, many of them being even almost fair. Most of them have a figure of great beauty, and a natural elegance of movement which their drapery and rich clothing well become. But the mind is totally neglected. In fact, until lately, when a gleam of light has begun to shine for women in the Land of the Veda, it might be said, without qualification, that no part of an American definition of education would apply to the culture under which a daughter of India is fitted for future life. It does not, for her, include reading, or writing, or history, or science, or aught else which we include in its meaning. Education, in its proper sense, is denied to the females of India; denied on principle, and for reasons which are unblushingly avowed, and all of which are reflections upon her womanly nature—one of them being the position that education in the hands of a woman would most likely become an instrument of evil power. She is deliberately doomed by modern Hindooism to a life of ignorance because she is a woman.
We have mentioned the present dawn of a better day. It is but the dawn. Dr. Mullen's statistics tell us that already there are now thirty-nine thousand six hundred and forty-seven women and girls receiving an education in the Zenana schools in India. The number is by this time larger and still increasing. Yet it is but
