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 in our respective vernaculars and national proceedings in Hindi, We ought not to rest till our schools and colleges give us instruction through the verna- culars. It ought not to be necessary even for the sake of our English friends to have to speak in English. Every English Civil and Military Officer has to know Hindi. Most English merchants learn it because they need it for their business. The day must soon come when our legislatures will debate national affairs in the vernaculars or Hindi as the case may be. Hitherto the masses have been strangers to their proceedings, The vernacular papers have tried to undo the mischief a little. But the task was beyond them. The Patrika reserves its biting sarcasm, the Bengalee its learning for ears tuned to English. In this ancient land of cultured thinkers the presence in our midst of a Tagore or a Bose or a Ray ought not to excite wonder. Yet the painful fact is that there are so few of them. You will forgive me if I have carried too long on a subject which, in your opinion, may hardly be treated as an item of Social Service. I have however taken the liberty of mention- ing the matter prominently as it is my conviction that all national activity suffers materially owing to this radical defect in our system of education.

Coming to more familiar items of Social Service, the list is appalling. I shall select only those of which I have any knowledge.

Work in times of sporadic distress such as famine and floods is no doubt necessary and most praiseworthy. But it produces no permanent results. There are fields of Social Service in which there may be no renown but which may yield lasting results.

In 1914 cholera, fevers and plague together claimed

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