Next in importance to the connubial is the convivial legislation of caste. It is the business of every member of a caste to conserve the purity of his _gens_ by eating only with his fellow-castemen. Under no circumstance can he inter-dine with those of a caste below his own. The dictates of caste in this matter are sometimes beyond understanding. Not only must a man eat with those of his own connection; he must be very scrupulous as to the source of the articles which he is about to eat; he must know who handled them, and especially who cooked them. Some articles of food, such as fruit, are not subject to pollution; while others, preeminently water, are to be very carefully guarded against the polluting touch of the lower castes. The writer has entered a railway car and accidentally touched a Brahman's water-pot under the seat, whereupon the disgusted owner seized the vessel and immediately poured out of the car window all its contents. It has been truly said that that monster of cruelty, Nana Sahib of Cawnpore, was able, without any violation of caste rules, to massacre many innocent English women and children at the time of the great Mutiny; but to drink a cup of water out of the hand of one of those tender victims of his treachery and rage would have been a mortal sin against caste, such as could be atoned for only in future births and by the fiery tortures of hell! The rationale of this interdiction is doubtless the desire to preserve the purity of caste blood. As food becomes a part of the body, and, as the Hindu thinks, of the life, it is imperative that all the members of a caste shall eat only the same kind of food, and also that which has not been subjected to the ceremonially polluting touch of outsiders. This urgency is increased by the fact that different castes proscribe different articles of diet. The _Sivar_, so-called, are strict vegetarians, and will have absolutely no communion in food with meat-eaters, even though the latter may belong to a higher caste than themselves. Meat of any kind is an abomination to them. Other respectable castes will touch only chicken meat, others mutton, a very few pork, while no caste will permit its members to eat beef. No sin is regarded by the orthodox with more horror than that of killing and eating the flesh of the cow,--the most sacred and most commonly worshipped animal of India.