द ब्यूटीफुल ट्री: १८वीं सदी में भारत की स्वदेशी गुरुकुल शिक्षा (धर्मपाल)

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XVII
COLLECTOR OF VIZAGAPATAM TO BOARD OF
REVENUE:
14.4.1823
(TNSA: BRP: Vol.947 Pro.1.5.1823 pp.3847-50 Nos.6-7)

1. I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your
   Secretary's letter of the 25th July last requiring a Statement of
   Schools and Colleges in this District.
2. Having now acquired the desired information I beg leave
   to forward the statement which is drawn out according to the
   prescribed Form.
   Waltair Collector's
   Cutcherry, J. Smith,
   14th April 1823.
   Collector
   .
   (Statement on following pages)
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XVIII
COLLECTOR, TRICHINOPOLY TO BOARD OF REVENUE:
23.8.1823
(TNSA: BRP: Vol.959 Pro.28.8.1823 pp.7456-57 Nos.35-36)

1. Information having at length been obtained on the
   subject of your letter of the 25th July 1822, I do myself the
   honor to submit the result. The annexed statement drawn up in
   correspondence with that which accompanied your letter, will
   show the number of native schools and colleges in this district,
   and the number of scholars male as well as female Hindoos of all
   castes, and Mussulmans, who are educated in them.
2. The scholars generally continue in the schools from the
   age of 7 to 15 and the average yearly expense of education is
   about 7 pagodas. There are no schools or colleges in this district
   for the support of which my public funds are appropriated, and
   in institutions for teaching Astronomy—Theology or any other
   science.
3. In the talook of Jyalore alone, and no other, there are 7
   schools, which were formerly endowed by some Native
   Government with between 44 and 47 Cawnies of land for the
   maintenance of the teachers.
   Trichinopoly, G.W. Saunders,
   23rd August, 1823. Collector.
   (Statement on following page)
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XIX
COLLECTOR, BELLARY TO BOARD OF REVENUE:
17.8.1823
(TNSA: BRP: Vol.958 Pro.25.8.1823 pp.7167-85 Nos.32-33)

1. The delay of my Amildars, in furnishing the requisite
   returns, has hitherto prevented my submitting to you the
   enclosed statement called for in your orders of the 25th July
   1822, and 19th of June last.
2. The population of this District is specified in the
   enclosed statement at 9,27,857 or little less than a million of
   souls. The number of schools is only 533 containing no more
   than, 6,641 scholars, or about twelve to each school, and not
   seven individuals in a thousand, of the entire population.
3. The Hindoo scholars are in number 6,398, the
   Mussulman scholars only 243, and the whole of these are males,
   with the exception of only sixty girls, who are all Hindoos
   exclusively.
4. The English language is taught in one school only. The
   Tamil in four, the Persian in twenty-one, the Mahratta in twenty-
   three, the Teloogoo in two hundred and twenty-six, and the
   Carnataca in two hundred and thirty-five. Besides these, there
   are twenty-three places of instruction, attended by Bramins
   exclusively, in which some of the Hindoo sciences, such as
   Theology, Astronomy, Logic and Law, are still imperfectly taught
   in the Sanscrit Language.
5. In these places of Sanscrit instruction in the Hindoo
   sciences, attended by youths, and often by persons far advanced
   in life, education is conducted on a plan entirely different from
   that pursued in the schools, in which children are taught read-
   ing, writing, and arithmetic only, in the several vernacular
   dialects of the country. I shall endeavour to give a brief outline of
   the latter, as to them the general population of the country is
   confined, and as that population consists chiefly of Hindoos, I
   shall not dwell on the few Mussulman schools in which Persian
   is taught.
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6. The education of the Hindoo youth generally commences
   when they are five years old. On reaching this age, the master
   and scholars of the school to which the boy is to be sent, are
   invited to the house of his parents. The whole are seated in a
   circle round an image of Gunasee, and the child to be initiated is
   placed exactly opposite to it. The school master, sitting by his
   side, after having burnt incense and presented offerings, causes
   the child to repeat a prayer to Gunasee entreating wisdom. He
   then guides the child to write with its finger in rice the mystic
   name of the deity, and is dismissed with a present from the
   parents, according to their ability. The child, next morning
   commences the great work of his education.
7. Some children continue at school only five years, the
   parents, through poverty, or other circumstances, being often
   obliged to take them away, and consequently, in such cases, the
   merest smattering of an education is obtained; and when
   parents take a lively interest in the culture of their children's
   minds, they not infrequently continue at school as long as
   fourteen and fifteen years.
8. The internal routine of duty for each day will be found,
   with very few exceptions, and little variation, the same in
   schools. The hour generally for opening school is six o'clock. The
   first child who enters has the name of Saraswatee, or the
   Goddess of learning, written upon the palm of his hand, as a
   sign of honor, and, on the hand of the second, a cypher is
   written, to show that he is worthy, neither of praise nor censure,
   the third scholar receives a gentle stripe; the fourth two, and
   every succeeding scholar that comes an additional one. This
   custom as well as the punishments in native schools, seem of a
   severe kind. The idle scholar is flogged, and often suspended by
   both hands, and a pulley, to the roof, or obliged to kneel down
   and rise incessantly, which is most painful and fatiguing but
   perhaps a healthy mode of punishment.
9. When the whole are assembled, the scholars according
   to their number and attainments, are divided into several
   classes. The lower ones of which are placed partly under the care
   of monitors, whilst the higher ones are more immediately under
   the superintendence of the master, who at the same time has his
   eye upon the whole school. The number of classes is generally
   four; and a scholar rises from one to the other, according to his
   capacity and progress. The first business of a child on entering
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school is to obtain a knowledge of the letters, which he learns by
writing them with his finger on the ground in sand, and not by
pronouncing the alphabet as among European nations. When he
becomes pretty dexterous in writing with his finger in sand, he
has then the privilege of writing either with an iron style on
cadjan leaves, or with a reed on paper, and sometimes on the
leaves of the aristolochia identica, or with a kind of pencil on the
Hulligi or Kadata, which answer the purpose of slates. The two
latter in these districts are the most common. One of these is a
common oblong board about a foot in width and three feet in
length. This board, when plained smooth, has only to be
smeared with a little rice and pulverized charcoal and it is then
fit for use. The other is made of cloth, first stiffened with rice
water, doubled in folds, resembling a book, and is then covered
with a composition of charcoal and several gums. The writing on
either these may be effaced by a wet cloth. The pencil used is
called Buttapa, a kind of white clay substance, somewhat
resembling a crayon, with the exception of being rather harder.
10. Having attained a thorough knowledge of the letters,
the scholar next learns to write the compounds, or the manner
of embodying the symbols of the vowels in the consonants and
the formation of syllables, etc., then the names of men, villages,
animals, etc., and finally arithmetical signs. He then commits to
memory an addition table, and counts from one to a hundred; he
afterwards writes easy sums in addition, and subtraction of
money; multiplication and the reduction of money, measures,
etc. Here great pains are taken with the scholars, in teaching
him the fractions of an integer, which descend, not be tens as in
our decimal fractions, but by fours, and are carried to a great
extent. In order that these fractions, together with the arith-
metical table, in addition, multiplication, and those on the
threefold measures of capacity, weight, and extent, may be ren-
dered quite familiar to the minds of the scholars, they are made
to stand up twice a day, in rows, and repeat the whole after one
of the monitors.
11. The other parts of a native education consist in
deciphering various kinds of hand writing, in public and other
letters, which the school master collects from the different
sources; writing common letters, drawing up forms of agreement;
reading; fables and legendary tales; and committing various
kinds of poetry to memory, chiefly with a view to attain
distinctness and clearness in pronunciation, together with
readiness and correctness in reading any kind of composition.
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