Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/335

Rh The Sudras sprang from his feet. They are therefore subordinate to all, and must, by mechanical and servile labours, contribute to the happiness of the high-born, especially to that of the Brahmins.

Such is the divine arrangement of castes, according to the holy books of the Hindus; but time has greatly changed both the number of castes and the rules by which they are governed. The Kschatrya or military caste, and the Vaisya or mercantile caste, have become almost extinct, leaving the Brahmins and Sudras as the two great divisions. These two have again been subdivided into many tribes and castes, so that it is commonly said that there are eighteen chief, and one hundred and eight minor castes. There is a large body of outcasts belonging to neither of the four original castes, and called Pariahs; though despised by the others, they have among themselves distinctions of dignity which they hold as tenaciously as do the higher orders theirs.

The number of castes will not excite wonder, when it is remembered that almost every employment or profession forms a separate caste. The members of these subdivisions, though belonging to the same great caste, will not inter-