the Asiatic Society, and is well known for his scientific attainments. His testimony is the more gratifying, because he is attached to the oriental class of opinions, and was one of the two members who seceded from the committee when it was resolved to take a decided course in favour of English.

The peculiar glory of the medical college, however, consists in the victory which it has obtained over the most intractable of the national prejudices, which often survives a change of religion, and was supposed to be interwoven, if any thing could be, with the texture itself of the Hindu mind. Brahmins and other high-caste Hindus may be seen in the dissecting-room of the college handling the knife, and demonstrating from the human subject, with even more than the indifference of European professional men. Operations at the sight of which English students not unfrequently faint, are regarded with the most eager interest, and without any symptom of loathing, by the self-possessed Hindu. Subjects for dissection are easily and unobjectionably obtained in a country in which human life is more than usually precarious, and where the respect felt for the dead is much less than in Europe. An injection of arsenic into the veins prevents that rapid de

composition which the heat of the climate would otherwise engender. There is now nothing to prevent the people of India from attaining to the highest eminence in the medical art; and we shall soon be able to make the college entirely national, by replacing the foreign by indigenous professors. The importance of this remarkable step in the progress of native improvement is so generally acknowledged, that even the Hindus of the old school have given in their adherence to the medical college; and the Shasters, with the elasticity peculiar to them, have been made to declare that the dissection of human bodies for medical purposes is not prohibited by them. The establishment of the medical college has received the approbation of the Court of Directors; they have indeed reason to be proud of it as one of the chief ornaments of their administration.

Besides settling the principle of national education, Lord William Bentinck prepared the means of ultimately extending it to the mass of the people. He justly considered that, to place this great work on a solid foundation, it was necessary to ascertain the exact nature and extent of the popular wants, the difficulties and the facilities of the task, and the local peculiarities which might require a partial change of plan. Our know

ledge of the existing state of feeling and of mental cultivation in the principal towns was sufficiently accurate to enable us to proceed with confidence, as far as they were concerned; but more minute information was necessary before we could venture to extend our operations from town to country, from the few with whom the European society are in direct communication to the body of the people. Mr. William Adam, a gentleman distinguished for his accurate and methodical habits of mind, and for his intimate acquaintance with the natives and their languages, was therefore appointed to make a searching inquiry into the existing state of native education in the interior. Mr. Adam has ever since been employed on his educational survey, and has visited many different districts, average specimens of which he has subjected to a strict analysis.

Meanwhile all the materials of a national system of education are fast accumulating; teachers are trained; books are multiplied; the interest felt in the subject is strengthening and spreading; and the upper class of natives in the towns are being prepared to aid by their influence and example in the enlightening of the lower classes in the country.

CHAP. II.

The Study of Foreign Languages and Literature a powerful Instrument of National Improvement. The Instruction of the upper and middle Classes the first Object.

THE past history of the world authorizes us to believe that the movement which is taking place in India, if properly directed and supported by the Government, will end in bringing about a decided change for the better in the character of the people. The instances in which nations have worked their way to a high degree of civilization from domestic resources only are extremely rare, compared with those in which the impulse has been communicated from without, and has been supported by the extensive study and imitation of the literature of foreign countries. The cases in which the most lasting impressions have been made upon national character, in which the superior civilization of one country has taken deepest root and fructified most abundantly in other countries, have a strong general resemblance to the case before us. In those cases the foreign systems of learning were first studied in the original tongue by the upper and middle classes, who alone

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possessed the necessary leisure. From this followed a diffusion of the knowledge contained in the foreign literature, a general inclination of the national taste towards it, and an assimilation of the vernacular language, by the introduction into it of numerous scientific and other terms. of all, the vernacular tongue began to be cultivated in its improved state; translations and imitations sprang up in abundance, and creative genius occasionally caught the impulse, and struck out a masterpiece of its own.

Every scholar knows to what a great extent the Romans cultivated Grecian literature, and adopted Grecian models of taste. It was only after the national mind had become deeply impregnated from this source, that they began to have a literature of their own. The writers of the Augustan age were bred in the school, were animated by the spirit, were nourished with the food of conquered Greece. Virgil was a mere imitator, however noble: the Roman dramas are feeble translations from the Greek: the entire Roman literature is only an echo of the Greek literature. The Romans made no scruple in acknowledging the obligations they were under to the cultivation of Grecian learning. Their enthusiasm was directed to the object of enriching their native