64 



SCIEN'CK 



LVoL. VIII , No. 180 



as such, and it is only after it that she in any 

 sense enters on the duties of female life. The 

 family she joins is exactly like that she has left, 

 only it is that of another ; to her a vast difference, 

 and one which she never forgets — indeed, it is not 

 unfrequently made painfully apparent to her at 

 every step. What may be called the regulation 

 Indian joint-family is one composed of the pater- 

 familias, all his sons and brothers, and various 

 extraneous relatives, such as nephews, cousins, 

 and wife's kindred, for the male part : and all 

 their wives, in addition to his own wife and 

 daughters, together with a sprinkling of the fam- 

 ily widows, for the female part. In this patri- 

 archy there are grades upon grades, both male 

 and female, dependent chiefly upon age and dis- 

 tance by blood from the head of the family ; and 

 as everybody is married in India as soon as the 

 time for it comes, the chances are that the last- 

 made bride is, in the nature of things, in the very 

 lowest place. 



In the average Indian family the strictest do- 

 mestic economy is the rule of life, and the house- 

 hold work is done by the women of the household, 

 not, as with us, by paid servants. Servants there 

 are, of com-se, in all Indian families, but they are, 

 as a rule, on a totally different footing from that 

 of the European domestic, being for the most part 

 independent persons with a clientelle, for whom 

 they perform certain customary services for a 

 customary wage. The distribution of the daily 

 work, down to the most menial kind, lies with 

 the materfamilias, who may be best described as 

 the oldest married woman in the family proper, 

 for widows can have no authority. The cooking, 

 as the work of honor, she keeps to herself, but 

 the house-cleaning, the washing, the care of the 

 children, the drawing of the water, the making of 

 the beds, and so on, is done by the less dignified 

 members of the household, as she directs; and 

 whatever is most menial, most disagreeable, and 

 the hardest work, is thi-ust upon the bride. 



Not only is our bride thus turned into a drudge, 

 often unmercifully overworked, but from the day 

 she gives up her childhood to the day of her death 

 — it may be for sixty years — she is secluded, and 

 sees nothing of the world outside the walls of the 

 family enclosure. She is also, by custom, isolated 

 as far as practicable from all the male members 

 of that little inner world to which she is confined. 

 Free intercourse, even with her own husband, 

 is not permitted her while yet her youthful capa- 

 bilities for joyousness exist. 



Every person belonging to the European races 

 well knows how much common meals tend to 

 social sympathy ; how powerful a factor they are 

 in promoting pleasurable family existence, and in 



educating the young to good manners. There is 

 nothing of this sort in Indian upper-class society. 

 There the men and women dine strictly apart, 

 the women greatly on the leavings of the men, 

 and that, too, in messes of degree, very like those 

 in a royal naval ship. Paterfamilias dines by 

 himself ; then the other men in groups, according 

 to standing, waited on by the women under fixed 

 rules ; and lastly the women, when the men have 

 done, our poor young bride coming last of aU, 

 obliged often to be content, it need hardly be said, 

 with the roughest of fare. 



Such, then, is one of those customs which go to 

 make an Indian woman's existence less happy 

 than it might be. Let us notice another, this 

 time as to family intercourse. No imported woman 

 may have any relations with those males who are 

 her seniors. Every bride is such an imported 

 woman, and all the household which she enters 

 who are the seniors of her husband are her seniors. 

 This at first generally includes nearly the whole 

 family, and must necessarily for a long while in- 

 clude the major part of it. In all her life she never 

 speaks to her husband's father, uncles, or elder 

 brothers, though dwelling under the same roof, 

 or, to speak more correctly, within the same en- 

 closure, for an Indian house is what we should 

 call a courtyard surrounded by sets of apartments. 

 On the other hand, paterfamilias has not only 

 never spoken to, but technically never even seen, 

 any of the younger wonaen of his varied house- 

 hold, except those born within it, though they all 

 dwell under his protection and at his expense. 



There is another custom regarding which it is 

 useless to pretend that it does not lead to endless 

 misery and family squabbling, — the absolute sub- 

 jugation of the women to the materfamilias. The 

 mother-in-law is indeed an awful personage in the 

 eyes of her sons' wives, one against whose will 

 and caprice it is hopeless to rebel. One cannot 

 describe her power better than by noticing a daily 

 ceremony which symbolizes it. It amounts to 

 wishing ' good-morning,' is called in Upper India 

 mdthd teknd, and consists of bowing down to the 

 ground and touching it with the forehead. All 

 the women, except her own daughters, perform it 

 daily to the materfamilias when they first see her, 

 and a bride must do it practically to everybody. 



An Indian woman's happiness in life immensely 

 depends on her becoming the mother of a son. 

 This at once I'aises her in the family estimation, 

 which is all in all to her ; insures her against the 

 greatest bitterness of widowhood, in case that 

 befall her ; and procures her domestic authority 

 should she survive the mature years with her hus- 

 band still living. Materfamilias is a veritable 

 queen in her own little world, often coercing her 



