which had been brought against him, replying to them with a wealth of learning and a cogency of reasoning which virtually closed the controversy. More than this, he enlisted the foremost men of the time,—Prasanna Kumar Tagore, Ram Gopal Ghose, Pratap Chandra Sinha and others, in the cause he had espoused. An appeal was made to the Government to declare that the sons of remarried Hindu widows should be considered legitimate heirs, and a law to that effect was passed in 1856.
Education in Bengal received a fresh start with the establishment of the University of Calcutta by Lord Canning in January 1857. The number of members was then only 39, of whom only 6 were Indians, and Vidyasagar was one of the Indian members. But his official connection with education was approaching its end; and it is painful to refer to the unpleasantness which marked its close. The Council of education was replaced by a Director of Public Instruction; and the first Director, Gordon Young, was a young and inexperienced officer. It is the old story over again; Vidyasagar the reformer of Sanscrit education in Calcutta, the founder of Vernacular education in the Central Districts of Bengal, the promoter of Female education, the earnest reformer and distinguished literary man, could not aspire to the highest educational appointment in his
