solitary college supported by the more or less resourceless family
of the Samudrin Raja. The Malabar data also shows 194 persons
studying medicine. As indigenous medical practitioners existed
in every other district and perhaps in every village—some of
them still in receipt of revenue assignments for their services to
the community—it can logically be assumed that similar
teaching in Medical Science existed in most other districts too.
What number and proportions in the various disciplines
were thus educated privately in the other districts, however, is a
speculative question. Still, it may not be too erroneous to
assume that the number of those ‘privately’ studying Theology,
Law, Astronomy, Metaphysics, Ethics, Poetry and Literature,
Medical Science, Music, and Dance (all of which existed in this
period) was perhaps several times the number of those who were
receiving such education institutionally.
The data from Madras regarding the number of boys and
girls receiving tuition at their homes is equally pertinent. In
comparison to those being educated in schools in Madras, this