, of companionship between man and wife. This
is very marked among the educated men of the Hindu community. Not only
by age, but also by educational and other qualifications, a wife is in
no condition to be a sympathetic companion to her spouse. So that the
relationship has, to them, little of mutuality in it.

The lot of the Hindu widow is, proverbially, a hard one. She is
despised and hated, even though she be but a child, because her
husband's family persist in believing that his death was caused by her
adverse horoscope. She suffers every obloquy in her husband's home, is
deprived of her jewels, has her head shaven, and is clothed only with
a coarse white cloth. Her fastings are long and severe, and she is not
allowed to attend any festivity; for the presence of a widow would be
deemed an evil omen and a curse.

Moreover, she is the object of suspicion, and is frequently the prey
of men's passions. It is a strange comment upon the religious
perversity of a people of the tender domestic nature of Hindus, that
they should deal with so much cruelty and such apparent indifference
to the bereavement and suffering of the unfortunate widow who bears
so tender a relationship to them. Religion has never wrought greater
cruelty and injustice to any one than to the Hindu widow, specially to
the child widow. And, notwithstanding the fact that these suffering
ones are a great host in this land, there are few of their people who
raise their voice in their defence or strive for their relief.

The relationship of son-in-law and mother-in-law is always a strained
one. The wife's mother may live with her under very decided
limitations. It is not permitted to her to eat in the presence of her
son-in-law, or to enter a room where he happens to be!

The situation is still worse between the daughter-in-law and the
mother-in-law. The vernaculars of India abound in proverbs which
illumine this relationship and reveal its strange character. The
husband's mother apparently delights in nothing more than in
exercising a cruel restraint over her son's wife. Nothing that the
young woman can do will please her. And the husband too often sides
with the older against the younger woman. When, however, the situation
becomes intolerable to the wife, she takes French leave, and goes home
to her parents. This soon brings her husband to terms; and it is
etiquette that he go and ask her to return, apologizing for the
troubles that she has endured. And