presents numberless occasions on which the stain of real or fancied impurity might be caught, the power of the religious class who define the rules of purity and the penalties of their violation becomes very great. Macleod has also stated two important elements which enter into the conception of caste : " That our place in the world is assigned to us by divine sovereignty ; and that the co-operation and sympathy of a brotherhood are essential to our usefulness and happi ness in the world."[1] There is no doubt that the Hindu mind is deeply religious, and therefore naturally prepared for Purohiti, or priest-rule. They were also passionately attached to their national hymns, some of which had led them to victory, while others were associated with the benign influences of nature. Only the priest could chant or teach these hymns, and it was believed that the smallest mistake in pronunciation would draw down the anger of the gods. But however favourable the conditions of spiritual dominion might be, it seems to have been by no more natural process than hard fighting that the Brahmaris finally asserted their supremacy. We are told that Parasurama, the great hero of the Brnhmans, " cleared the earth thrice seven times of the Kshatriya caste, and filled vith their blood the five large lakes of Samauta." Mr Wheeler thinks that the substitution of blood-sacrifices for offerings of parched grain, clarified butter, and soma wine marks an adaptation by the Brahmans of the great military banquets to the purposes of political supremacy. It is not therefore till the Brahmanic period of Indian history, which ends with the coming of Sakya Mouni, in 600 B.C., that we find the caste-definitions of Manu realized as facts. These are " To Brahmans he (i.e., Brahma) assigned the duties of reading the Vedas, of teaching, of sacrificing, of assisting others to sacrifice, of giving alms if they be rich, and if indigent of receiving gifts."[2] The duties of the Kshatriya are " to defend the people, to give alms, to sacrifice, to read the Veda, to shun the allurements of sensual gratifica tion." The duties of a Vaisya are " to keep herds of cattle, to bestow largesses, to sacrifice, to read the scripture, to carry on trade, to lend at interest, and to cultivate land." These three castes (the twice born) wear the sacred thread. The one duty of a Sudra is " to serve the before-mentioned classes without depreciating their worth."[3] The Brahman is entitled by primogeniture to the whole universe ; he may eat no flesh but that of victims ; he has his peculiar clothes. He is bound to help military and commercial men in distress. He may seize the goods of a Sudra, and whatever the latter acquires by labour or succession beyond a certain amount. The Sudra is to serve the twice born ; and even when emancipated cannot be anything but a Sudra. He may not learn the Vedas, and in sacrifice he must omit the sacred texts.[4] A Sudra in distress may turn to a handicraft ; and in the same circumstances a Vaisya may stoop to service. Whatever crime a Brahman might commit, his person and property were not to be injured ; but whoever struck a Brahman with a blade of grass would become an inferior quadruped during twenty-one trans migrations. In the state the Brahman was above all the ministers ; he was the rajah s priest, exempt from taxation, the performer of public sacrifices, the expounder of Manu, and at one time the physician of bodies as well as of souls. He is more liable than less holy persons to pollution, and his ablutions are therefore more frequent. A Kshatriya who slandered a Brahman was to be fined 100 panas (a copper weight of 200 grains) ; a Vaisya was fined 200 panas ; a Sudra was to be whipped. A Brahman slandering any of the lower castes pays 50, 25, or 12 panas. In ordinary salutations a Brahman is asked whether his devotion has prospered ; a Kshatriya, whether he has suffered from his wounds ; a Vaisya whether his health is secure ; a Sudra whether he is in good health.[5] In administering oaths a Brahman is asked to swear by his veracity ; a Kshatriya by his weapons, house, or elephant ; a Vaisya by his kine, grain, or goods ; a Sudra by all the most frightful penalties of perjury. The Hindu mind is fertile in oaths ; before the caste assembly the Dhurm, or caste custom, is some times appealed to, or the feet of Brahma, or some cow or god or sacred river, or the bel (the sacred creeper), or the roots of the turmeric plant. The castes are also distinguished by their modes of marriage. Those peculiar to Brahmans seem to be, 1st, Brahma, when a daughter, clothed only with a single robe is given to a man learned in the Veda whom her father has voluntarily invited and respectfully receives ; 2d, Devas or Daiva, when a daughter, in gay attire is given, when the sacrifice is already begun, to the officiating priest. The primitive marriage forms of Rashasas or Rachasa, when a maiden is seized by force from home, while she weeps and calls for help, is said to be appropriate to Kshatriyas. To the two lower castes the ceremony of Asura is open, in which the bridegroom, having given as much wealth as he can afford to the father and paternal kinsman and to the damsel herself, takes her voluntarily as his bride. A Kshatriya woman on her marriage with a Brahman must hold an arrow in her hand ; a Vaisya woman marrying one of the sacerdotal or military classes must hold a whip ; a Sudra woman marrying one of the upper castes must hold the skirt of a mantle. How little the system described by Manu applies to the existing castes of India may be seen in these facts (1) that there is no artisan caste mentioned by Manu; (2) that eating with another caste, or eating food prepared by another caste, is not said by him to involve loss of caste, though these are now among the most frequent sources of degradation. The system must have been profoundly modified by the teaching of Buddha : " As the four rivers which fall into the Ganges lose their names as soon as they mingle their waters with the holy river, so all who believe in Buddha cease to be Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, arid Sudras." After Buddha, Sudra dynasties ruled in many parts of India and under the Moghul dynasty the Cayets, a race of Sudras, had almost a monopoly of public offices. But Buddha did not wish to abolish caste. Thus it is related that a Brahman
Pundit who had embraced the doctrines of Buddha never-
- ↑ Peeps at the Far East, p. 186.
- ↑ The great mass of the Brahmans were in reality mendicants, who lived on the festivals of birth, marriage, and death, and on the fines exacted for infractions of caste rule. Others had establishments called Muths, endowed with Jageer villages. There were two distinct orders of officiating priests, the Purohita, or family priest, who performed all the domestic rites, and probably gave advice in secular matters, and the Guru, who is the head of a religious sect, making tours of superin tendence and exaction, and having the power to degrade from caste and to restore. In some cases the Guru is recognized as the Mehitra or officer of the caste-assembly, from whom he receives Huks, or salary, and an exemption from house and stamp taxes, and service as begarree (Steele s Law and Customs of Hindoo Castes within the Dekhun Pro vinces, 1826; new edition, 1868). Expulsion from caste follows on a number of moral offences (e.g. , assault, murder, &c.), as well as cere monial offences (e.g., eating prohibited food, eating with persons of lower caste, abstaining from funeral rites, having connection with a low-caste woman). Exclusion means that it is not allowed to eat with or enter the houses of the members of the caste, the offender being in theory not degraded but dead. For some heinous offences, i.e., against the express letter of the Shasters, no re-admission is possible. But generally this depends on the ability of the outcaste to pay a fine, and to supply the caste with an expiatory feast of sweetmeats. He has also to go through the Sashtanyam, or prostration of eight members, and to drink the Panchakaryam, i.e., drink of the five products of the cow (Description of People of India, Abbe J. A. Dubois, Missionary in Mysore, Eng. Tr. , London, 1817. There is a valuable new edition of this work by Mr Pope, Madras, 1862).
- ↑ Manu, x. 88-90.
- ↑ As to the rights of the castes to participate in domestic rites, see {{9link|Brahmanism|sc=1}, vol. iv. p. 204.
- ↑ Wheeler, ii. 533.
