The Harim and the Purdah: Studies of Oriental Women

by Elizabeth Cooper

This cord may be seen on all Brahmans and on the members of a few of the higher castes, hanging from the left shoulder to the right hip. It is composed of three strands of cotton, each strand formed by nine threads. The cotton with which it is made must be gathered from the plant by the hand of a Brahman, and corded and spun by persons of the same caste, in order that it may not be defiled by passing through the hands of persons who are ceremonially unclean. For a young boy the cord has only three strands, but after he is married it is composed of six strands and may have nine. It is symbolical of the body, speech, and mind, and when the knots are tied, means that the man who wears the thread has gained control over these three organs that cause all worldly troubles.

At the end of the ceremony the guests accompany the boy, who is elaborately dressed and seated in an open palanquin, through the streets to the sound of singing, music, and merry-making. On his return to his home, he, for the first time, performs the sacrifice of fire, showing that he is now a member of his caste and a twice-born son of India.

If the mother belongs to a poor family, quite likely her boy will work to earn a few annas to add to the family exchequer, or if they are farmers, his days will be passed in the fields frightening the greedy crows from the ripening crops or driving away the animals that infest the fields which are near the jungles. In Baroda, education is compulsory; but many a mother gets around the law by paying the fine of two rupees a month, and selling her small boy’s labour for five rupees, thus gaining a livelihood.

England has established free schools in every town and village, and there is little excuse even for the boy or girl of poor parents not to have an education. Even members of the depressed classes, or, as they are called, the pariahs, have their schools. The question that is agitating the minds of the educators is what form of education should be given these sons of a people who have been practically slaves for many centuries. Many contend that they should have only a technical education, that the sons of the carpenter caste should be made better carpenters, and that they should not be made barristers. A lady said to me: “Said, my sweeper’s son, goes to school, and after getting an education he naturally feels himself better than his father, a sweeper, or his uncle, who is my groom. He cannot affiliate himself with a higher caste than that into which he was born, as they will not accept him, and he has outgrown his own caste. What is he to do? He puts on a foreign hat and leaves his home, and in the next census, drops his name of Said Faruki and becomes John James Jones, a half-caste, and the census-taker wonders why there has been such an increase in half-castes. The population of half-castes grows from the lower castes who wish to raise themselves, but it is kept down in the census returns by the half-castes who wish to better themselves socially, and call themselves Portuguese or subjects of some other dark-skinned race of Europeans.”

This question of the education of the Indian youth is a very serious problem with which those who have the welfare of India at heart have to contend. Many a boy when he returns to his home and his people says: “Why did they educate me?” There are few avenues of livelihood open to the Indian boy, as there is no Army or Navy or Church in which to enlist so many of the younger sons as in England or America. The main prizes are the Government offices, and failing these, the chief desire of all Indians is to be a lawyer. There are few places in the Government employ now, and the country is flooded with impecunious barristers.

The Indian feels that he has a real grievance in the question of the Civil Service examinations. For the higher positions in this service it is necessary for the student to go to England and obtain his degree at an English university. The question of expense is a bar to the great majority. One often hears of parents mortgaging their homes and practically selling themselves to the moneylender for life, that the boy may have this one great opportunity. If he wins, they have not struggled in vain, but if he fails, life will be very grey and grim, because quite likely his life and his son’s, and his son’s son’s life will be given in a vain attempt to get rid of the burden of debt which seems to always hang over the heads of India’s poor.

The question of the education of the daughter is not so much a matter of thought to the middle-class Mohammedan or Hindu mother, because at the time when, if she were in Western lands, she would be taking her books under her arm and starting for her first day at school, in India she is getting married. She may, if in a village, attend the school with her brothers until she is eight or nine years old, but rarely, except in the highest classes, does the little girl have a longer opportunity for study. In the cities the rich families are sending their daughters to private schools, and the Oriental home is the happy hunting ground for the English governess, who is engaged to teach, not only the knowledge to be found in books but also the etiquette to be observed in English society, as it seems to be the main object in life of the educated Indian, both man and woman, to be more English in manner than are the English themselves.

In all the better class homes the piano is seen, and seldom now does the daughter of the house play upon the veena or any instrument of Indian music. In Calcutta I went to a reception given by a great Indian lady. With the exception of the costumes worn by the pretty dark-eyed Bengalis, and the absence of men, I would have thought I was in an English house at an afternoon tea. English was spoken by nearly every one, the music was European, the refreshments were from an English caterer, and there was no distinct note of India in all the afternoon’s ceremonies. Most of the ladies wore high-heeled French slippers, and many of them had their beautifully draped saris twined around bodies held in place by the French corset, which must have been most uncomfortable for these people, used to untrammelled freedom in regard to their dress.

Times are changing so fast in India that it is hard to say “This is a custom” or “That is a custom.” Education is opening the eyes of the younger generation of Indian women to the fallacy of many of the old-time rites and superstitions. Still, many of the mothers are conservative and feel keenly their daughter’s departure from the beliefs of her day, yet the pressure is so strong that many of these conservative mothers are sending their daughters to the schools, both mission and Government, where in the former they avail themselves eagerly of the education, but are not influenced by the religious teaching. One devout Mohammedan mother said to me: “Yes, I send my daughter to a mission school, as it is the best in our town. I feel that they cannot hurt her, as she has had a good religious training in the home.”

A great many of the mothers feel that the present system of education for women in India is wrong, and that the text-books are not the ones that should be adopted for the use of Indian children. The stories have little to do with Indian life, and the children do not understand them. For instance, stories of snowstorms, ice, and things that are to be seen in a foreign land, are far above the understanding of the average Indian girl. It is also said that the girl is taught of Joan of Arc and of English heroines, but nothing is said of the heroines of Indian history, nor is anything taught of Indian history before the English occupation. There is nothing given the child to inspire a feeling of patriotism, nor is she given any moral training except in the mission schools. She is given a certain amount of book knowledge, which quite likely she cannot assimilate, and is considered educated. I remember visiting a girls’ school where the teacher asked a class of girls to recite Wordsworth’s poetry, extracts from Shelley and Keats; they could tell the place of birth and give the list of English poets and chronology of the English kings most glibly, but what actual good it afforded the Indian girl to have all these interesting facts in her little head I could not see.