The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c7.16

c7.16

The Malabars have a mode of writing peculiar to themselves: it may be called with more propriety engraving. The letters are imprinted on a palm leaf dried and prepared by a particular process. Instead of a pen, they make use of an iron instrument with a sharp point resembling the stylus of the ancients. When they write on paper, they have recourse to the pen; but this is only in imitation of our manners or of the Mohammedans. Stones, skins, leaves, and the bark of trees, were the earliest materials made use of in writing. These leaves are not subject to decay, and resist vermin. They may be preserved a long time, much longer perhaps than paper; they write in general only on one side and from left to right. They cut the leaves into different sizes, and manufacture them of different qualities, which may be compared to different sorts of paper. They are made to answer either for books, notes or letters. They are formed into neat and convenient sized volumes not by stitching or binding but by stringing them together. A blank space is left at the end like our margin, through this a hole is made which admits a string or cord, generally of silk, and this drawn tight, or tied round them keeps the whole secure. The leaves are opened and unfolded by the Natives with the same facility as we do those of our books. The Malabar books are bound or covered by two pieces of wood which serve as boards, and which are varnished and painted according to taste.