the direct
result of this difficulty. For instance, among the noble race of Rajputs
in North India it was found, some years ago, that, in a community of
30,000, there was not a single girl! Every daughter that was born was
killed. The higher the rank of the family the more constant and systematic
was the crime. "Thus, while an unmarried daughter in India is looked upon
as hopelessly disgraced, a son-in-law cannot always be found unless the
father of the girl is prepared to pay highly, and the marriage of a
daughter may mean the ruin of a family. Rather than incur this danger, the
Rajput preferred that his daughter should perish. And though the
government has enacted stringent laws against this custom, it is not
entirely eradicated yet."(10)

Thus the Hindus have wittingly and unwittingly placed many of the most
serious disabilities of life upon their women. And the greatest evil of it
is that the woman has become so hardened to her lot that, like the
prisoner of Chillon, she has become enamoured of her chains and is most
loathe to part with her bondage.

3. But the dawn of a new day has risen upon India. It is the day of
woman's emancipation. A new spirit, during the past century, has entered
that land, and the welcome era of brighter blessing, greater appreciation
and larger opportunity for woman has actually begun. One has only to study
the laws which, during the nineteenth century, were enacted in India with
a view to removing the terrible evils and crimes which were committed
under the sanction of Hinduism; and he will find that not a few are
directed towards the amelioration of the condition of woman. Such inhuman
customs as _suttee_, the murder of children, the dedication of girls to
lives of shame--these have been removed in whole or in part; and, by the
"Age of Consent Bill" and other similar half measures, the beginning has
been made in introducing a day of better things for the women.

Many of the efforts of Hindu Social Reformers are directed towards the
removal of some of the disabilities under which woman lives. It is true
that the woman of India cannot expect, for a long time, much help from her
own people. Even the Social Reformers among them are so few in number, are
so half-hearted in their measures, and are so unwilling to deny themselves
in behalf of the cause which they advocate, that little can be expected
from them. And yet, it must be said that in a few matters of importance
Hindu sentiment is s