The instruction given at
these schools I understood to be merely oral, the repetition of a few
verses, intended rather to pass away the time and keep the children
out of mischief, than as a foundation of more useful studies. I
hope that the system will be improved, for the pupils seemed to be
extremely intelligent, and capable of better things.
Returning home, I passed several shops, in which the artizans of a
very beautiful manufacture, peculiar to Bombay, were at work. Desks,
dressing-cases, work-boxes, card-cases, ink-stands, and a variety of
other ornamental fancy articles, are made of sandal-wood, covered and
inlaid with ivory, ebony, and a material resembling silver. They copy
the best patterns, and produce exceedingly elegant appendages for
the drawing or dressing-room tables. A desk, handsomely fitted up and
lined with velvet, is sold for seven or eight pounds; large ink-stands
and blotting books for twenty rupees, and card-cases for six or eight.
It is impossible, while perambulating the Fort of Bombay, to avoid
a feeling of apprehension concerning a catastrophe, which sooner or
later seems certain to happen, and which nothing short of a miracle
appears to prevent from taking place every night; I mean the
destruction of the whole by fire.
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