AN OUTCAST FOR CHRIST’S SAKE.
Sooboonagam Ammal, formerly daughter of Mr. Vankataramana Pantula, sub-judge of the District of Madura, India, is visiting friends in southern New York. She is no longer the daughter of Mr. Pantula, because she has renounced the superstitions of Brahmanism for the Christian religion. She has thereby become an outcast, and she is staying with her Christian friends in America because she has no home. Worth several millions, the possessor of jewels of fabulous wealth, and a member of the highest of castes, she has renounced them all for the sake of the faith. The case of Sooboonagam is one of the most remarkable in the history of Christian missions, and reads like an Eastern romance. Her father was the first native Indian to take the double degree in the University of Madras. He possessed great wealth, was the most influential man in the district, and stood high in the confidence of the government. But his greatest wish was for a son to inherit his name and fortune, and when Sooboonagam was born he was deeply disappointed at her sex. However, the soothsayers assured him that his daughter was born at a most propitious time and she was destined to great honors at the hands of the gods. It was determined, therefore, to devote her to their service. She was brought up strictly in the Brahman forms and ceremonies, and a temple was built by the father for the girl’s own use. It was her onerous duty, also, to make offerings to the sacred cobras, which she fed daily with flour and milk, and occasionally she accompanied the priests on expeditions into the jungle, for the purpose of catching the reptiles. Her father grew to be very fond and proud of her. At the age of ten she was married, the bridegroom being a poor man, and being selected because he was the nearest marriageable relative, as custom required. But Sooboonagam had enough wealth for two, for on the death of her father she was to come into possession of a fortune worth millions. There was great feasting and merry making at the nuptials. To her husband was given her weight in silver, she being put on one side of the scales and the precious metal on the other. Some years afterward Sooboonagam came to know the story of Jesus. Through Christian missionaries in the district, she was persuaded to read the Bible in her own tongue, and they found means to talk to her on the subject. She was delighted with the Gospel, and finally decided to give up her fortunes and her home for the new faith. She knew13that if she became a Christian, it would mean that she would be disowned. Despite the pleadings of her friends and relatives, she remained firm. She left home and was sheltered by the missionaries. The Brahmans treat one who apostatizes as dead, and so within a few weeks, notices of invitation to her funeral were sent out, and hundreds attended. The services lasted three days, during which Sooboonagam’s treasures were broken, and everything devoted to her personal use was given away or destroyed. An effigy of the young woman was made with sacred reeds from the Ganges and burned amid great ceremony. To her family and friends, she was now as dead as though actually in the tomb. This summer Sooboonagam came to Binghamton, N. Y., to visit Miss Fannie Sparks, a returned missionary, who had interested herself in the case. She may return to India herself as a missionary.—Christian Herald.