Evidences of bigger assemblies consisting of representatives of more than one village, sometimes of more than one district, to decide cases of importance or dispute between whole villages are also cited in Paragraphs 26 and 27 and 32. On the strength of certain South Indian Inscriptions relating to the Tamil Kingdoms of the 10th century A.D., it is stated that the administration of the village was carried on by no less than five or six committees, each vested with jurisdiction relating to certain definite departments of village life, though there was no fixed rule on the point. In Paragraphs 33 and 34 the mode of election to the committees and the qualifications for membership are set down in detail. The procedure seems to have been quite elaborate, though suited to the level of intelligence of the people concerned. These village councils and committees looked after education, sanitation, poor relief, public works, watch and ward, and the administration of justice. To describe the methods by which these departments of village life were administered by the village councils requires too much space, but we give two excerpts from Chapter II on education: "The history of village education in India goes back perhaps to the beginnings of the village community. The schoolmaster had a definite place assigned to him in the village economy, in the same manner as the headman, the accountant, the watchman, and the artisans. He was an officer of the village community, paid either by rent-free lands or by assignments of grain out of the village harvest." "The outstanding characteristics of the schools of the Hindu village community were: (1) that they were democratic, and (2) that they were more secular than spiritual in their instruction and their general character.... Nevertheless, when we speak of the democratic character of these early Hindu schools, it is to be understood that they were democratic only in this sense, that they were open not merely to the priestly caste but to all the four superior castes alike. There was never any question of admitting into the schools those who lay outside the regular caste system whose touch would have meant pollution, nor to the great aboriginal populations of the country." "This is very similar to the public schools in the Southern States, in the United States, where schools for the white children are closed to coloured children and vice versa."