The female who attends a lady while she is dressing, &c., is called an _Ayah_; pretty nearly corresponding with the ‘lady’s maid’ among us. The wages of this servant are by no means settled, but may be taken on average at from eight to twelve rupees monthly. Some are _half-cast_ children; that is, of European fathers and native mothers: brought up in families from their infancy. To these, good treatment and kindness should form a valuable compensation for the smallness of wages; and induce some among them to remain for numbers of years, faithful and affectionate; but such are by no means numerous, when compared with the thousands who, at a certain age, either quit in search of places affording either higher pay, or handsome perquisites; or who, if handsome, engage as ‘house-keepers to single gentlemen!’ The majority of _ayahs_ are of Portugueze extraction, being descended from those heroes who, in times of yore, ‘laid bleeding Asia prostrate at their feet;’ but who now compose the most contemptible race to be found on earth; affording to the natives ample scope for comparison between the modern, and the quondam European. These Portuguese are all ‘good Christians,’ and, in several parts of the country, have small church-establishments, where they support missionaries; but in that humble style which strongly represents that abject state of Christianity, when the disciples were in a state of persecution. However much their ancient splendor may have been tarnished, yet it cannot be denied, that, in religious matters, the sable Portugueze of Bengal have out-done the British completely. They had long ago churches, and have now one in Calcutta, built at a great expence by an opulent individual, which may at least competite with the only English steeple to be seen under the presidency of Fort-William. This solitary type of English devotion, was built some twenty years ago, in an old burying ground, where the bones of many worthy men, among whom I reckon my own grand-father, had lain in peace for scores of years; but which, in making arrangements for the new edifice, were torn up, and exposed, without much regard to decency. It would be difficult to pourtray the horror expressed in the countenances of many natives, who were witnesses of the disgusting scene: as to their observations, they were indeed pointed; and conveyed their decided detestation of so sacrilegious an act. I say sacrilegious, because no Mussulman would allow even the remains of his most bitter enemy, to be ejected from their last asylum!