Before discussing it, it would be proper to fix our ideas as to what education means.

In its primary sense it is a leading out of ignorance, an exodus from that land of Egyptian darkness and bondage, or dropping metaphor, it may be defined as the fitting out of a human being for that state in life to which it has pleased God to call him, the gifting him with the capacity to vindicate his right to existence. This settled, we shall better be able to judge how far the end aimed at is carried out. In writing this I do not pretend to put on a wig and gown and look wise. All I intend is putting in a modest and dispassionate form my opinions on the subject, with no great anxiety as to what reception they may meet with. If these prove of little value and do no good, I am sure they will do no harm so happen what may !

None will, I hope, dispute that our object in training up girls is to render them better in their social relations of mothers, wives and daughters; and that the education of a mother, wife and daughter is but the complement of that of the father, husband and son. i

Men of large views and liberal principles have undoubtedly taken a step in the right direction in instituting schools for girls, to rescue the mass of a rising female generation from the slough of ignorance and superstition. But I suppose they are not agreed as to what sort of education to impart. Some like Thomas Gradgrind-men of realities, of facts and calculations, who proceed upon the principle that two and two are four and nothing over, are for the practical school, a school where facts and facts alone are the one thing needful and nothing else. Some of a devout turn of mind regard religion as all in all, while others would have it all literature and fine arts. By this I would not have it understood that the schools as at present conducted are altogether defective in

their plan. Far from it. On the contrary, I would say that elementary education in a few of its branches is satisfactorily given and received. But this is not all that is wanted. A glimpse behind the scenes of Parsee society would serve to show what prejudices and superstitions prevail there. These have to be rooted and swept out. And what besom with its irresistible rush can do it but education? The one now given in schools is of an elementary character, and all honor to those who work in that line and to the promoters of such a cause. But it is after all the bending of the twig, the laying of the foundation. The bent twig is never fashioned into an ornamental corbel, the foundation never rises to be a sublime temple. It is a higher system of education alone that can ennoble and elevate the understanding. This yet remains to be done. Let the enlightened promoters do it. It is for the upper classes that I advocate this system of training. It is they who give the tone of morals, of religion, and of fashion to the lower classes. How to set about doing it is now the question. Our Gujerati school-book series is an epitome of the various departments of knowledge. A little of everything and too much of nothing is what they contain. The arts, the sciences, history, poetry and tales all come in for their share, But that share is too little. However it is just enough to excite the curiosity of an enquiring mind, and to awaken the intelligence of the illiterate.

It is a conviction beyond doubt that a marvellous faculty resides in books. "Books are not seldom talismans and spells," says Cowper. The spirit of Homer inhabits the dogseared volume over which the schoolboy fondly pores and drinks it in with all his eyes; Xenophon renews the retreat of the ten thousand; and the harp of Pindar preserves Thebes.

It is unfortunate that Gujerati literature is a poor one. What we have of so-called works is more an apology for what

we have not. Original works are out of question, good translations very rare, and cheap literatúre not yet known. This may be, I think, owing to want of encouragement, which is a consequence of want of good readers. People are of opinion that the higher forms of education are necessarily connected with the acquisition of the English language, and it is not worth their while to devote their thoughts to enriching their adopted mother-tongue. Between the two languages there is no comparison surely; and a translation however faithful can never bring out in relief the niceties of the original. But that is no reason why an honest attempt at reproducing standard English works should not be made in Gujerati. It is not within everybody's reach to study the English language. How is their mental darkness to be illumined? How are such to hold intercourse with superior minds, how talk to those departed kings of learning who lie embalmed in literature, how learn the fate of sumptuous cities--Carthage, Rome, Tyre-which the pen of the historian or the poet has immortalized? How lay bare before such minds the beauties that lie hid in the poems of Milton, of Dryden, of Pope? How many weary hearts creeping from noisome dwellings and narrow alleys to look at the green grass and blue sky, who sit upon the benches and let soul and body breathe in an atmosphere free from natural and moral impurity, have been transported in imagination while perusing some favourite poet-to walk in the green alleys of broad forests, to hear the stream ripple and the fountain fall! Such unalloyed delights which constitute the poor man's wealth, how are they unknown to the unlucky beings who have no knowledge of English! Can nothing be done to render Gujerati literature a little more inviting?

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Histories as such, which embody all that is pleasant in

poetry and fiction, wherein we read of high-born dames and

'i

an

gentle knights, of deeds of love and high emprise, of noble walls and royal palaces where troubadours sang, are not they wanting to make up a high-class education? To watch the progress of the human mind through its successive stages of development, to mark the grandeur and the decadence of empires, to see Persia glowing on the historical canvas and Assyria sinking into shadow, Greece construct a Parthenon, Rome a Colosseum, Byzantium a St. Sophia; these are entertainments which open sources of information, cherish feelings of virtue and enlarge their action. The memoirs of great minds, of pure and noble lives, of hearts warm with sympathy for the great and the small, have no existence in our literature. The lives of real men and women, of how they lived and died and what their characteristics were, furnish examples to the living and pay a tribute to the dead. These are mirrors wherein we can see models for imitation. Instruction in amusement as held forth by novels and romances is fast becoming popular amongst us. I am inclined here to gainsay the wide spread prejudice existing, and the general sentence pronounced against this class of productions. Well may they sweepingly condemn the licentious novel. But those pictures of life, those scenes of rural existence which are humble epics, these afford innocent pleasures which no rhetoric can inveigh against. What pestilence can there be in Little Nell, gentle and patient; in Pip, a victim to false shame; in Dinah Morris, a resigned Methodist; and in Ethel Newcome, generous and bewitching, visiting her poor relations? Does one run the risk here of alighting on anything wanting in healthiness and moral tone? We are not half grateful for the solace of fiction. It has cheered the hours of convalescence, whipped lagging time into a pleasing amble, and poured the rosiest tint on the dingiest window. We must therefore welcome these compositions, or rather translations from select

English authors, which deal with the destinies of families, portray scenes from private life, and indulge in humorous dialogues, as so much gain to our literature.

Our Gujerati newspapers, as the "abstract and brief chronicles of the time," and as a page in the every-day history of the world, are what we would desire them to be. It is through this medium that the Parsee girl is supplied with the little information that she is possessed of.

Scientific education forms no part of her culture, The sublimest and the simplest truth of natural laws she does not know. Of the great discoveries of astronomy, of the triumphs of navigation, the powers of steam, the railroad and the telegraph, she hears with a curious and wondering stare. Is it not necessary, then, for the promoters of education to direct their energies towards a more desirable state of studies than what at present exists? We have nothing like a society for young ladies, no reading-room or library, no institute where lectures specially adapted for them can be delivered and discussed. Again :

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Something in these aspiring days we need
To keep our spirits lowly,

To set within our hearts sweet thoughts and holy."

Does the young girl who sits during her silent hours on in her home-nest kindling up a tropical horizon of her own, know the sacred influence of pulpit eloquence? The pathetic sermon and the "melting mystic lay" of music are well calculated to draw the soul sweetly away from the world's tumult. It is the preacher who grapples with questions of perennial interest. He settles the question of duty for a tried and tempted being, deals with woes which often latent wring at some time or another every human spirit. He tears off the mask from the painted show, exposes to view the hollowness and insincerity of life, shatters its idols,