will
repressive measures alone ever place any very complete check upon it. Like
every other demand, it rises and falls with the necessities of the
situation, and can never be originally caused by anything in the shape of
caste feelings or regulations; and amongst these necessities I, of course,
include the desire to avoid shame, or the prospect of shame in the family,
or starvation, as well as the fact that women are an encumbrance to some
tribes. Some people, I may add, are under the impression that polyandric
habits, when once established, become necessarily a cause of infanticide.
But we have no means of knowing that this was ever the case, while the
Coorgs may be pointed to as a race who once were polyandrous, but who were
never, that I am aware of, accused of infanticide. The explanation of
this, I apprehend, is to be found in the fact that their circumstances
were comfortable enough to preclude any necessity for keeping down the
population.

It is time now that I should bring this chapter to a close, but, as it may
be a convenience to the reader, I think it well, before doing so, to sum
up those conclusions which I assume to have been established; in doing so
I shall, however, merely take notice of those points which seem to me to
be of paramount importance.

In the first place, then, we compared the morality of our British
counties, as regards the connection of the sexes and the use of alcohol,
with the morality of the Indian county of Manjarabad; and having seen
that, owing to caste laws, the morality of Manjarabad is superior, I think
we are justified in concluding that these laws have acted more effectually
than all the religious instruction that has for centuries been lavished on
the people of this country; or, to put the case in shorter terms, we may
assert that, as regards the branches of morality alluded to, caste has
beaten Christian influences.

In the next place we took into consideration the action of our
missionaries as regards caste, and having seen that they have always
insisted on their converts entirely renouncing customs which can be proved
to produce the most valuable results, we came to the conclusion that it
has been a fortunate thing for India that its peoples have rejected our
hide-bound interpretation of Christianity. We then inquired as to whether
the missionaries had any right to debar from the advantages of
Christianity those who, wishing to become Christians, yet desired to
retain t