Their most serious difficulties were at an end before poor Thomas, though he had recovered from his brain fever, died of an attack of fever and ague, after having done almost an equal amount of good and harm to his cause by his excitable nature and entire want of balance. Converts continued from time to time to be gathered in: Goluk took courage after waiting about two years, and a Brahmin named Krishnu-prisad trampled on his brahminical cord or poita, and was baptized. He was allowed to wear it as a mark of distinction, but he gave it up voluntarily after three years. Moreover he broke through Indian prejudice by marrying the daughter of Krishnu, the first convert, though of a caste far inferior to his own. This was the occasion of a happy little wedding feast, given under a tree in front of the house of the bride's father, when a hymn composed by Krishnu was sung, and native dishes served up in Eastern style, after which the entertainment concluded with prayer. Only the next week, in contrast to the devotion that blessed these family ties, three Hindoo widows were burnt on a pile not far from the mission-house! In still greater contrast was the first funeral among the converts of the mission-house--that of a man named Gokool. The native custom is that the dead are always carried to burial by persons of their own caste, and it is intense defilement for one of another caste to touch the body. Christians were always carried by the lowest class of the Portuguese, who had fallen into so degraded a state that they were usually known by their own word for poor, "pobre," and were despised by the whole population. They were generally drunk and disorderly, and their rudeness, irreverence, and quarrels were a scandal to the solemn occasion. Mr. Marshman, who was in charge of the mission at the time in Mr. Carey's absence, had some difficulty in persuading the Hindoo converts that it was no shame, but a charitable work, to bear a brother's body to its last resting-place, even though they were seen doing the work of the despised pobres. Accordingly he resolved to set the example, and the corpse of the convert, within a coffin covered with white muslin, was carried to the burial-ground by Marshman, Felix Carey, a baptized Brahmin, and a baptized Hindoo, all the procession singing a Bengalee Christian hymn.