Lighted to Lighten: the Hope of India by Alice B. Van Doren
page 40 of 167 (23%)
page 40 of 167 (23%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
every member from the "queen" to the most rollicking five-year-old has
her share in making things go. The queen takes her turn in getting up at dawn to see that the "water set" is at the well on time; five-year-old Tara wields her diminutive broom in her own small corner, and each is proud of her share. There is in Indian life an unfortunate feud between the head and the hand. To be "educated" means to be lifted above the degradation of manual labor; to work with one's hands means something lacking in one's brain. Not seldom does a schoolboy go home to his village and sit idle while his father reaps the rice crop. Not seldom does an "educated" girl spend her vacation in letter writing and crochet work while her "uneducated" mother toils over the family cooking. Girls, however, who have spent hours over the theories of food values, balanced meals, and the nutrition of children, and other hours over the practical working out of the theories in the big school family, go home with a changed attitude toward the work of the house. Siromony writes back at Christmas time, "The first thing I did after reaching home was to empty out the house and whitewash it." Ruth's letter in the summer vacation ends, "We have given our mother a month's holiday. All she needs to do is to go to the bazaar and buy supplies. My sister and I will do all the rest." On Christmas day, Miracle, who is spending her vacation at school, all on her own initiative gets up at three in the morning to kill chickens and start the curry for the orphans' dinner, so that the work may be well out of the way before time for the Christmas tree and church. Golden Jewel begs the use of the sewing machine in the Mission bungalow. All the days before Christmas her bare feet on the treadle keep the |
|