572 Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [June, 



the sale of the books, to print by degrees many of the most approved works in the 

 classical and vernacular languages of India, and to remunerate learned natives for 

 their services as authors and editors. It cannot I think be regarded as unreason- 

 able to expect that this small sum may be deducted from the annual grant of a lac 

 of rupees, since it cannot be denied that the act of parliament contemplated in part 

 if not wholly a provision for the encouragement of learned natives and the revival 

 of native literature, terms that can by no possible construction be interpreted as 

 applicable to the introduction of English alone. The trifling abstraction of the sum 

 I have suggested will be thought by all impartial persons much less than native 

 literature, strictly so called, is legally entitled to, but it may be accepted as adequate 

 to the specific purpose for which it is required, and it will satisfy the natives that 

 their interests have not been altogether despised. With regard to the annual ap- 

 propriation also the deduction will be more nominal than real. Under the former 

 management of the funds of the committee the lac of rupees was never wholly ex- 

 pended, and an accumulation took place which when I left India placed an additional 

 20,000 rupees per annum at the committee's disposal. This can scarcely have been 

 since appropriated or expended, and a fund should therefore exist from which 6000 

 rupees a year can be disbursed and yet a lac of rupees and more may be annually 

 laid out upon English tuition if such a disbursement for that purpose be considered 

 expedient. 



J 2. With regard to translations and compilations from English in the native lan- 

 guages, these are so obviously and intimately connected with the actual progress of 

 education, that they will be best left under the superintendence of the Education 

 Committee. If transferred to the charge of the Society however, the expense should 

 be borne by the general fund according to the circumstances of the rules and the 

 resolutions of the Education Committee. 



13. There is but one other point upon which I beg briefly to trouble the Court ; 

 the scholarships of the native colleges which have been prospectively abolished by 

 the Government order of the 7th of March. If the native endowments are not 

 alienated the chief object of the abolition of the scholarships the diversion of the 

 money, so applied hitherto, to the future extension of English education will no 

 longer be a plea for such a measure— a measure that is a virtual abolition of all 

 native institutions. I can assure the Honorable Court that this question of stipen- 

 diary allowances to native students in the government seminaries was very fully 

 discussed by the members of the committee of public instruction upon its first for- 

 mation, and that they were generally opposed to the principle of paying young men 

 to induce them to accept of gratuitous education. When examined in all its bearings 

 however and with reference to the extreme poverty of the literary classes, the dis- 

 tance from which many of the students came, the desirableness of attracting students 

 from the country to the seats ot Government, and their utter want of means 

 of maintaining themselves when away from home, the principles and practice 

 of all the native Governments which invariably combined subsistence and edu- 

 cation, and the prejudices of the people, which attach discredit to all but elee- 

 mosynary instruction, the committee came to the determination that it was in- 

 dispensable in the present condition of society in India to continue stipendiary allow- 

 ances to the scholars at the public institutions ; at the same time Iney limited such 

 allowances to an amount merely adequate to provide for the necessary wants of the 

 student, and they endeavoured to encourage the resort of students who would dis- 

 pense with the provision. A reference to the rolls of the several native Colleges 

 will shew that the stipends are very moderate and that there are a number of 

 students who receive no pay. The reports of the college committees will also shew 

 what is the real character of these unpaid students, and that from the extreme irregu- 

 larity of their attendance they reap from it but little benefit: greater punctuality 

 cannot be enforced by any penalty short of dismissal and that it is an award which 

 cannot in common charity be hastily pronounced ; the scholars cannot attend, because 

 they must live ; part of their time is taken up in obtaining subsistence from the 

 liberality of their countrymen, or in plain words in begging — a practice ill calculated 

 to elevate their moral or intellectual character, but one which is the chief resource 

 of poor scholars in the east, as it was some centuries ago in Europe. As most of 

 these unpaid scholars also attend in the hope of succeeding to vacant scholarships, 

 if the latter were abolished the former would soon disappear. However reasonable 

 therefore the principle of separating maintenance from education it is certainly in- 

 capable of being applied to practice in India. The government has been obliged to 

 admit this in the new medical institution, and has granted stipends to the students 

 which are no doubt much move considerable than those which are allowed to the 

 pupils of the Madressa and Sanskrit College. I apprehend too that the scholar- 

 ships of the Hindi or Anglo- Indian College held by the native students of the Eng- 

 lish language will be continued, as they most unquestionably ought to be, and the 



