of unglazed earthenware, and that the coffee was served in a gourd.  This was in order that they might be at once destroyed.  By no special dispensation could those vessels ever again be purified for the use of a respectable Hindoo; even a pariah would have felt insulted if he had been asked to eat from them; and if the knives and forks and spoons had not been my own, they must have shared the fate of the platters.  But this prejudice must be taken in a Pickwickian sense,—­it covered no objection simply personal to the Sahib.  In some castes it is forbidden to eat from any plate twice, even in the strictest privacy of the family; and many natives, however wealthy, scrupulously insist upon leaves.  All respectable Hindoos lift their food with their fingers, using neither knife, fork, nor spoon; and for this purpose they employ the right hand only, the left being reserved for baser purposes.  In drinking water, many of them will not allow the lotah to touch the lips; but, throwing the head back, and holding the vessel at arm’s length on high, with an odd expertness they let the water run into their mouths.  The sect of Ramanujas obstinately refuse to sit down to a meal while any one is standing by or looking on; nor will they chew betel in company with a man of low caste.  Ward has written, “If a European of the highest rank touch the food of a Hindoo of the lowest caste, the latter will instantly throw it away, although he may not have another morsel to allay the pangs of hunger";—­but this is true only of certain very strait sects.  There are numerous sects that admit proselytes from every caste; but at the same time they will not partake of food, except with those of their own religious party.  “Here,” says Kerr, “the spirit of sect has supplanted even the spirit of caste,”—­as at the temple of Juggernath in Orissa, where the pilgrims of all castes take their khana in common.

At our quarters in Cossitollah even this progressive Karlee will not taste of the food which has been served at our mess-table, though it be returned to the kitchen untouched.  But at least he is consistent; for neither will he take medicine from the hand of a Sahib, however ill he may be; nor have I ever known him to decline or postpone the performance of this or that duty because it was Sunday,—­as many knavish bhearers do when they have set their hearts on a cock-fight.  To compound for sins one is inclined to, by damning those one has no mind to, it is not indispensable that one should be a Christian.

The amiable Mr. James Kerr, of the Hindoo College of Calcutta, has contrived an ingenious and plausible apology for the constitutional (or geographical) laziness of Bengalese servants.  He says:  “A love of repose may be considered one of the most striking features in the character of the people of India.  The Hindoos may be said to have deified this state.  Their favorite notion of a Supreme Being is that of one who reposes in himself, in a dream of absolute