recognise his inferiority to his Hindu neighbours and makes tentative approaches with a view to inclusion in civilised society, his first duty is to abjure the diet of pork and rice-beer which his unregenerate appetite loves, since these indulgences stand in the way of sharing a meal with Hindu folk. (In other parts of India, liquor and meat are consumed by low-caste Hindus of aboriginal origin.) In Assam, a Kachāri first accepts the _sarana_ or "protection" of a Hindu Goshain. He is then called a Saraniya Koch. His next step is to abandon strong drinks, on which he is promoted to the status of a Modāhi Koch. At this stage, he may be fortunate enough to win the hand of a bride of pure Koch family, and, under her guidance, acquires enough of conventional habits and beliefs to be recognised as a Kāmtāli or Bor Koch, and is a true Hindu, a member of a genuine Hindu caste. Musalmāns and Christians have other social conventions, and do not usually regard them as essential to good manners or godliness. But their converts retain their social superstitions and carry them into the new surroundings, where they sometimes come into disagreeable contact with the ethical ideas belonging to imported religions. The contact of Aryan with Dravidian races, some three thousand years ago, brought about the beginnings of caste, which, from one point of view, may be regarded as a rude form of "race-protection," a primitive system of eugenics. It is still most rigidly enforced in the south, where the semi-Aryan classes are in a great minority. It is most relaxed in the Panjāb, where, though caste rules exist, the population is, and probably always has been, as homogeneous as our own race. French travellers in India have sometimes said, half-humorously, that the Anglo-Indian administrators and merchants are practically a caste unto themselves. Bengalis have made the same remark and have said that our Civil Service is composed of _Kali Yuger Brāhman_, "the Brāhmans of the Iron Age." There was once some truth in the accusation, if accusation it be. It was not our business to interfere deliberately with caste, since British policy from the first has been one of kindly neutrality and toleration. Whether indirect influences have mitigated the effect of the sentiment of caste is a moot point. Educated Indians who have lived in Europe see its irksomeness, and in some cases denounce it more vigorously than most Europeans will care to denounce a system due to historical causes which are still partly operative. On the other hand, railways and other facilities for travel, though they have necessarily introduced laxity in matters of food and contact, have probably heightened the caste feeling by emphasising the variety of Hindu humanity and of the customs and habits of its many races. Hence the evolution of Indian society remains as interesting and as incalculable as ever.