Weekly national intelligencer., 1857-10-17
5 WASHINGTON. sATURDAal OCTOBER I7. 1857.
THE INDIAN MUTINY.

THE INDIAN MUTNY. s.
We insert the following article from ! Boston
journal because of the historical facts it adduces
with reference to the long standing Of the probable
causes it assigns to the present Sepoy mutiny in
India The writer appears to think that this move
ment finds its motive and origin in an impression,
whether well or il-founded, that the British Gov
erdnent had already interfered and purposed still
further to interfere, with the enjoyment By the
HindoQs Of their ancient religion and customs.
It doubtieA hecopes delicate question for a
Christian nation % deterape how far il shall coun
tenance or discountenance the cese1ooies and dog
mas Of the heathen worship embraced BY subject
people. The rights Of conscience should certainly
Be respected in India as well IS elsewhere yet we
suppose that the writer Of the sbioined paper
Who signalizes as inipdicious she passage Of law
which permits The Hindd -.dow to marry again,
would hardly contest the propriety Of the edct BY
which the suttee was abolished. Inn n = iz3
IS our contemporary truly states, tI p 5 . ! ks
undsrtakes TO prescribe the canons
which regulate the descent transmission, and con-
veyance of property, the relations of husband and
wife, parent and child guardian and ward, master
and servant, and even appoints what garments
shall be worn and how the nails shall be trimmed,
it would indeed be singular if the East India Com
pany in exercising any power at all in india should
not sometimes come into real or apprehended con-
Hict with certain ancient usages and hoary preju-
dices of the people. 1t is but just to add however
by way of set-of to some of the statements in the
article we subjoin, that many intelligent minds in
England impute the revolt to undue concessions
made to the popular religion of India, rather than
to the restrictions which have been enioined upon
the exercise of of its rites and which in truth
to have been dictated rather by humanity than
by Christian proselytism.
FROM THE BOSTON COURIER OF OCTOBER Z.
Mr.. D'IsRAELI in speech in the House of Commons
the 9th of July last states that of the of
the present outbreak in India is to be found in the
perng cn the part of the Government with the religion
of the people There little doubt that this state
ment is to some extent true. For very long period
indeed from the arrival of Saint Francois Xavier Goa
in 1542Christanity has been preached in India both
by Roman Catholics and Protesants There are this
Portuguese in India and a numerous body of clergy
The whole number of Catholic estimated to
about million The first Protestant missionaries ap-
peared in Tranquebar the Coromandel coast in 1906
under the patronage of the King of Denmark and for
considerable period Danes and Germans labored in this
field with admirable devotion and zeal The first Eng
hsh missionary went out to India late 1877. For
Protestant missions have been carried there
with great earnestness There at present in India
agents of twenty-five missionary societies. nearly all of
which either English American. There are 448
missionaries and 698 native preachers and cathechists
18 40 communcants and 112, 191 native Christians.
DR.. ALLEN, from whose work the above statistics are
derived to think this rather an encouraging
cord; but We hardly agree with him, especially
when take into his candid and Cautious state
ment that the 112191 native Christians who are not
communicates 'snominally Christians that is they
Christians in the lower but not in the higher sense
We fear that may be said of most of them that they
have put off religion without putting on another.
But the preaching of the gospel missionaries though
may have made but few converts awakened but little
alarm long appeared be merely the action of
individuals associations independent of the Govern
ment. The intellectual curiosity of the intelligent Hin
doos and Mahometans somewhat roused but nothing
They SUBTLE but impassive very fond of re-
hgious and metaphysical discussion but very tenacious
of opinion and little under that class of sentiments and
emotions which Christianity most powerfully addresses
converts that have been made rule
from the lowest classes of the people, and the least
| noxious to public opinion.
But it very different thing when the people of
India to the conclusion least the apprehen-
son that the East India Company and the English Gov
ernment animated by propagandist zeal The
of this is to be found in the that in India
both Mahomean and Hindoo secular and religious ins
tutions grow out of the same root. The Koran the
Vedas, the Institutes of Menu contain expositions of
doctrine, ethical rules for the conduct of e and the
rudiments of civil code. From them are drawn the
which regulate the descent, transmission and
conveyance of property and prescribe the correlave
rights and duties growing of the leading relations of
life such as husband and wife, parent and child guar
dian and ward, master and servant Religion in India
shapes and dictates nnumerable ceremonial acts and OBJ
1t prescribes what food shall be taken what
garments shall be worm how the hair and nails shall be
trimmed how often the body shall be washed Hindoo
| or Mahometan who becomes Christian must undergo
changes and submit to sacrifices such as Western ina
gination can hardly conceive Of We have all heard of
the institution of caste among the Hndoos; but we can
scarcely imagine the depth to which that idea has struck
its roots in the Hindoo mind according to Hindoo
laws, 1--WE quote from Dr. Aen) ga man excluded from
MS caste loses all MS martial parental Social and civil
rights He is to be expelled at from his house and
home, to be dsowned by his family and friends and
be driven from all society He be regarded dead
and funeral rites of peculiar character be per-
formed for him. His legal heirs take possession of his
property, as though he dead. His family, his
friends and all his caste unite in executing the sentence
which has been passed upon him.
So long ago as 1906 mutiny broke out among the
Sepoys at Vellore, city in the Madras Presidency in
the of which hundred and sixycur European
soldiers were killed and many officers. After this there
was similar mutiny at Nundydroog; and a spirit of
daecton manifested itself in other places in the Ma
dras Presidency These troubles arose from an appre-
hension the part of the soldiers that they
forced to abandon their religion will appear from an
extract we make from proclamation which issued
by the Government of Madras:
"The Right Honorable the Governor in Council having
observed that in late instances extraordinary degree
OF agitation has prevailed among several corps the native
Of hiacn - hnnl