Mr. Low quotes from the census report of Sir H. Risley further to illustrate what the caste system means in the matrimonial sphere, that sphere that especially touches the womanhood of India—
“He imagines the great tribe of the Smiths throughout Great Britain bound together in a community, and recognizing as their cardinal doctrine that a Smith must always marry a Smith, and could by no possibility marry a Brown, a Jones, or a Robinson. This seems fairly simple; there would be quite enough Miss Smiths to go round. But, then, note that the Smith horde would be broken up into smaller clans, each fiercely endogamous. Brewing Smiths,” Sir H. Risley asks us to observe, “must not mate with baking Smiths; shooting Smiths and hunting Smiths, temperance Smiths and licensed-victualler Smiths, Free Trade Smiths and Tariff Reform Smiths, must seek partners for life in their own particular section of the Smithian multitude. The Unionist Smith would not lead a Home Rule damsel to the altar, nor should Smith the tailor wed the daughter of a Smith who sold boots.”
In its effect upon women the caste system has been most deleterious because of the difficulty of finding husbands within the same caste. It has led to the making away with undesirable daughters, which was frequently practised by the parents before the English Government stepped in and made female infanticide a crime and severely punished the culprits. Yet we are told that the disproportion of female to male children shows that the practice has not been completely stamped out, and that many fathers foreseeing the financial difficulties to be encountered in marrying their daughters, have deliberately made away with them at birth. In the smaller villages the crime is difficult of detection, but when the ratio of girls to boys falls particularly low in a community, the Government quarters extra police upon the people, making all the inhabitants contribute towards the cost of their maintenance, and the records soon show that girl babies are again being born in the villages.
Life in a high-caste Brahman family is much more complicated than that of the low-caste family, and many burdens are added to the already heavy ones borne by the Hindu woman, because of the rituals and customs woven around this caste system. A woman told me that she had a friend who lived in the house of two maiden aunts who were most orthodox Hindus. This woman was not allowed to touch a thing in the morning before her bath. Beside her bed was a long pole with which she must handle her towels and clothing, and she was not permitted to enter the presence of her aunts until her uncleanliness had been removed by ablutions and prayers.
The mother-in-law of my friend has practically no social intercourse with her son’s wife because she has broken caste, eats with Europeans, and wears shoes made from leather. Her own mother at first felt her daughter’s disgrace keenly, and would not see her for many years. At last love triumphed over custom, and now the mother will visit the daughter if assured that a place will be made ceremonially clean where she may spread her mat of holy dharba grass, on which she sits while chatting. She will receive nothing from the hand of her daughter, neither water nor food, and when she returns home she takes a complete bath and changes her wearing apparel that has become polluted by contact with her daughter’s house.
Orthodox Hindus do not like sitting upon a mat of cloth or walking upon a carpet. In many houses a wooden bench or board is kept for visitors. The wife of a Resident in one of the Indian cities gave a reception to which came several ladies from the conservative Hindu families. They carefully avoided walking upon the rugs, and sat upon the edge of the chairs, looking most unhappy. The wife of the Resident asked an advanced Hindu lady why her afternoon was not a success so far as the Indian guests were concerned. She was told that the only thought that possessed these little women was a desire to get home. They wished to be polite and stay as long as etiquette demanded, but they welcomed with avidity the finality of the party when they might return and bathe and purify themselves from the close contact of foreigners and Mohammedans.
The members of the Brahmo Samaj, that progressive offshoot of Hinduism, have broken caste and allow their women to go about freely. I was in a town of Southern India with a member of this sect, and we called upon the head mistress of a large school for girls. She was at home with her newly born baby, waiting for the forty days of uncleanness to pass before returning to her school. She was a very intelligent woman, talking freely of the good and the bad of their social system. She said that a school for girls such as that of which she was the head, where four hundred young girls were being educated in modern thought, would have the greatest influence upon the women of the next generation, but that it would take time to eradicate the instincts of generations of ignorance and superstition, so deeply woven into the very nature of the Indian woman.
At the close of the visit the baby was brought to me, and rather lacking a subject for conversation I made the unfortunate remark to the baby, “You will grow up a good Hindu and stick to your caste.” I was not prepared for the storm of protest it raised from my friend who had brought me to the home. She turned on me furiously and said: “How can you say such things, you, a modern woman? Caste is the ruin of India. If we want progress we must break caste: it is our only hope.”
It is not caste alone that makes the rules that govern the life and actions of the Indian woman, but from birth to the burning-ground every detail of life is cast into a mould of ceremony and ritual, which in the hands of a less spiritual people would have degenerated into mere sham. Of the sixteen events in the life of a man, all are viewed from a religious aspect, and accompanied by a religious ceremony. The most sacred prayers are said in the morning before partaking of food, and it is the husband, the head of the house, who is supposed to say the prayers for all beneath his roof-tree. “No sacrifice is allowed to women apart from their husbands, no religious rite, no fasting; as far as a wife honours her lord, so far is she exalted in heaven,” says the laws of Manu, yet the instinct of religion is strong in the Hindu woman, as it is in women all over the world, and they do perform a worship. At the time of her marriage, at the marriage of her children, and at many of the sacred feasts, the wife must sit with her husband during the time he is engaged in the performance of the acts of worship, though she takes no active part in the ceremonies. If a man has lost his wife, he cannot perform the sacrifice of fire.
The Hindu woman has her gods, which she keeps in the kitchen, the most sacred room in a Hindu household. In all the time I was in India I never saw the inside of the kitchen of any of my Indian friends. I have been told that it is divided into two parts, the smaller room used for the cooking and as pantry for the storing of food, and must be kept free from ceremonial defilement. The larger half of the kitchen of a middle-class household serves as dining-room, and in an alcove or in one corner are the household gods and the utensils to be used in their worship. None of the images used by a woman are consecrated, but she lights her lamp and bows her head and prays for the safety of her dear ones, then offers a bit of fruit or betel or a sweetmeat that she has prepared, and scatters sandal paste and coloured rice or the petals of sweet-smelling flowers over her god. There is generally in each tiny yard or in the kitchen a tulasi plant, around which the women walk while chanting a prayer. This plant is considered the wife of Vishnu, and is revered by all. There are many blessings promised to one who attends and waters one of these plants, and it will keep care and tribulation from its worshippers and grant pardon to the sinner who cherishes the tulasi plant. Yet it is more particularly worshipped by women. At one time, it is said, women were commanded to walk around it one hundred and eight times each day, which certainly was a blessing from a hygienic point of view, as it gave exercise to these shut-in women, who are restricted to the four walls of their homes.