In Norway and Sweden they formerly wrote, or rather
engraved, on flakes and planks. They wrote on wooden tablets.
Poetry was inscribed on staves. A verse is therefore still called a
stave.^8
The mode of writing or engraving on leaves was probably at
one period extended all over India. It is mentioned by
Abdulrizack who travelled in 1442, as the common practice at
Bisnaghur.^9
There is no difficulty in multiplying schools at present in
India to any extent provided funds are furnished. The people are
anxious and earnest in calling upon the Missionaries for teach-
ers. With a little patience, we may introduce into these schools
any books that we please. In them the children know of no
precedence, but that which is derived from merit.^10 This is an ex-
traordinary testimony in favour of the native character, and from
a source where we can expect no kindly prejudice. They
entertain no suspicion of the ultimate designs of their
instructors; but with candour and openness send their children
to school, where we are elsewhere informed, no difficulty was
found in introducing the scriptures, when done with discretion.^11
They sacrifice all the feelings of wealth, family pride and caste
that their children may have the advantages of a good education.
This desire is strongly impressed on the minds of all the
Hindoos. It is inculcated by their own system, which provided
schools in every village. The learned and the ignorant, one of the
Missionaries writes from Chinsuram, congratulate one another,
that their children now enjoy the great blessings of education.
Native free schools were once universal throughout India.
It has been long the practice in Malabar to translate the
Sanscrite writings into the common tongue, and to transcribe
them in the vernacular character. By this means knowledge has
been more generally diffused among the inhabitants; it is less
confined to any order or class, and the people are better
acquainted with the mysteries and dogmas of their religion. This
spirit of enquiry and of liberty has most probably been affected
by the sooders who compose the great body of population, and
who were in possession of the principal authority and property
in the country.