A nautcha cannot sin, in spite of
the crowd of the "celestial musicians" who swarm in every pagoda,
in the form of baby-vestals and their little brothers. No virtuous
Roman matron was ever so respected as the pretty little nautcha.
This great reverence for the happy "brides of the gods" is especially
striking in the purely native towns of Central India, where the
population has preserved intact their blind faith in the Brahmans.
Every nautcha can read, and receives the highest Hindu education.
They all read and write in Sanskrit, and study the best literature
of ancient India, and her six chief philosophies, but especially
music, singing and dancing. Besides these "godborn" priestesses
of the pagodas, there are also public nautches, who, like the
Egyptian almeas, are within the reach of ordinary mortals, not
only of gods; they also are in most cases women of a certain culture.
But the fate of an honest woman of Hindostan is quite different;
and a bitter and incredibly unjust fate it is. The life of a
thoroughly good woman, especially if she happens to possess warm
faith and unshaken piety, is simply a long chain of fatal misfortunes.
And the higher her family and social position, the more wretched is
her life.
