To Europeans, and more especially to Englishmen, who have, for more than a century and a half, been the great and beneficent arbiters under Providence of the destiny of this vast empire, a correct knowledge of the domestic and social institutions of the Hindoos, is of the most vital importance, being essentially indispensable to a right understanding of the existing wants, wishes, feelings and sentiments, condition and progress of the subject race. Many erroneous ideas concerning the singular customs and observances of the people of India still prevail in Europe and America. They are partly due to defective observation, and partly to the prejudices of men whose minds are too pre-occupied to properly understand and appreciate the peculiar phases of character, manners and usages among nations other than their own. Such men are unfortunately led to associate the Natives "with ways that are dark and tricks that are vain." To remove the mass of misconception yet prevailing in some quarters by placing before the general reader a true and comprehensive knowledge of the daily life of a people, who occupy such a huge spot on the earth's surface, and whose numbers are counted by hundreds of millions, is indeed an important step towards the solution of a great social problem, and towards the removal of the gulf that divides the sons of the soil from the English rulers of the country. The tendency of close and constant intercourse is to promote an identity of interests between the two races. As a Native, the author may be allowed to have had the facilities requisite for acquiring a clear idea of the manners and customs of his countrymen, which may counterbalance in some degree the drawbacks and deficiencies naturally experienced by him on the score of language. The Rev. W. Hastie, B. D., Principal of the General Assembly's Institution, and Mr. J. B. Knight, C. I. E., have laid me under great and lasting obligations by their kind suggestions and encouragement. I have particularly to thank the former for the prefatory note which he has written in response to my special request. SHIB CHUNDER BOSE. I. THE HINDOO HOUSEHOLD. It is my intention in the following pages to endeavour to convey to the mind of the European reader some distinct idea of the present manners and customs, usages and institutions of my Hindoo countrymen, illustrative of their peculiar domestic and social habits and the _inner_ life of our society, the minutiae of which can never be sufficiently accessible to Europeans. "It is in the domestic circle that manners are best seen, where restraint is thrown aside, and no external authority controls the freedom of expression."