Lighted to Lighten: the Hope of India by Alice B. Van Doren
page 34 of 167 (20%)
page 34 of 167 (20%)
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Seeta loves her home, but before a month is over its close confinement palls and she writes back, "I am living like a Muhammadan woman. I wish it were the last day of vacation." Her father is shocked by her desire to be up and doing. He calls on the school principal and complains, "I don't know what to make of my daughter. Why is she not like her mother? Are not cooking and sewing enough for any woman? Why has she these strange ideas about doing all sorts of things that her mother never wanted to do?" Then the principal tries to explain patiently that new wine cannot be kept in old bottles, and that unless the daughter were to he different from the mother it was hardly worth while to send her for secondary education. So, when the long holiday is over, Seeta returns with a fresh appreciation of what education means in her life; and we know that when _her_ daughters come home for vacation, it will be to a mother with sympathy and understanding. The girls' loyalty to their school is at times almost pathetic. An American teacher writes, "One moonlight night when I was walking about the grounds talking with some of the oldest girls, one of them caught my hand, and turned me about toward the school, which, even under the magic of the Indian moon, did not seem a particularly beautiful sight to me. 'Amma' (mother), she said, in a voice quivering with emotion, 'See how beautiful our school is! When I stand out here at night and look at it through the trees, it gives me such a feeling _here_,' and she pressed her hand over her heart. "'Do you think it is only beautiful at night?' one of the other girls asked indignantly, and all joined in enthusiastic affirmations of its attractions even at high noon,--which all goes to show how relative the matter is. I, with my background of Wellesley lawns and architecture, |
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