1834.] in the work of Native Education. 513 



the brahmans of Sehore, who have become converts to the Siddhanta 

 and our system, all express the utmost anxiety to get globes if possible 

 in Hindi, convinced that they will prove to others as they have done 

 in their own case, the readiest means of demonstrating to them the 

 truth. 



16th. It is strange and deserving of remark, that though astronomy 

 is the science which has been most cultivated by the Hindus, and has 

 most attracted the notice of the learned in Europe, and, as above shewn, 

 is also best calculated to promote the work of education, still not a 

 single standard, or indeed any work whatever on this subject, has yet 

 been printed in India. From Mr. Lushington's History of the Cal- 

 cutta Institutions, it appears in pp. 126, 127, that in the Government 

 Sanscrit College the Jyotisha Shastra is not even embraced in the 

 course of study pursued there. It surely has incomparable advantages 

 over the Hindu systems of Logic, Rhetoric, Prosody, and even over 

 Law and Grammar, as far as education is concerned, essential though 

 the last mentioned be. So entirely have we neglected the study of 

 late years, that Professor Schlegel (as I observed from a late number of 

 your Journal) takes credit to himself for being the first to expound to 

 the European scholar, the method used by the Hindus in their astro- 

 nomical works, of expressing numbers by symbolical words. You seem 

 inclined to give to the learned Professor great credit for having unra- 

 velled this mystery in the absence of native pandits. It is by no 

 means my wish to detract from the merits of the learned Professor ; 

 but surely when every astronomical work is accompanied by a commen- 

 tary, explaining in plain language, and also in figures, the symbolical 

 expressions of the text, little credit is claimable for unravelling a mys- 

 tery already made plain. Under these circumstances, it is by no 

 means strange, that Messrs. Colebrooke, Davis, Bentley, and Jones, 

 thought it unnecessary to offer any explanations on a method at first 

 sight so mysterious, but so palpable on referring to the commentary 

 which almost invariably accompanies the text. 



17th. But to return to the subject in hand, it seems to me most de- 

 sirable, that the books above-mentioned should be published without 

 delay ; at present revered though they are, they are exceedinglv diffi- 

 cult to be procured. Any gentleman moderately conversant with 

 Sanscrit, and with the elements of the science of astronomv, will, if 

 he have leisure, readily master all they contain in a very few 

 months. This accomplished, how largely will his powers of superin- 

 tending the work of education, and especially that of translation be 

 augmented! I trust that not a few of the many ardent friends of edu- 

 cation will avail themselves of the advantages to be derived from these 

 2 u 



