CASTE AND CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM IN INDIA. [To THE EDITOR OF
THE " SPECTATOR."1 SIR,—The convincing argument on p. 361 of your issue of Sept- ember 20th, based on the great work of Dr. Vincent Smith, is generally applicable to Hindus, but I think you may be interested to learn from my personal knowledge that Moslems in India are equally conservative. I was stationed at Arun- gabad in 1859, where an elderly Mussulman of high repute had come twelve years earlier adopted two baby girls found starving in a road.less distrat before the time of railways, when famines were periodic. He had them carefully brought up in the female establishment of his own family, until that year when they arrived at puberty. The girls then asked to see him and, thanking him respectfully for his years of hospi- tality, said: " Mabap, we are very grateful, but we learn that our mother was a prostitute and it is incumbent on us to follow her art; therefore, please send us out into the world." The good man, although much distressed, acquiesced. You will find also a remarkable instance of conservatism, under the titre of "A Dutiful Assassin," in a book I published some years ago called Winnowed Memories, p. 23 (Cassell and Co.).—I am,
Millhurst, Harlow.
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