So easily is caste set aside, when the convenience of the people themselves is concerned.
But the following are much stronger instances: the majority of the Bengalees do not eat meat, which cannot be ascribed to a compliance with the injunction against destroying life, since almost all will eat fish whenever they can procure it. The shasters do not prohibit the use of flesh; so far from it, they prescribe several sorts of flesh to be sacrificed for offerings to the manes of ancestors, yet, the habit of refraining from meat, which most probably originated in the poverty of the people, has now become so inveterate, that I have been assured by eye-witnesses, that in the great famine in Bengal in 1770 many died of starvation, who could have procured meat, if they would have eaten it.
By way of distinction from the Muhammedans, the mode of killing animals for food among the Hindus is, by cutting off the head with a sabre at one blow; but about Saharunpoor, there is a tribe of bearers, who will only eat meat that has been made “Hullal,” or lawful, that is, killed by a Moosulman butcher, who repeats a short prayer at the time of cutting the animal’s throat. This can only have arisen from accident probably, (there being a considerable Muhammedan population at that town,) because they were unable to procure meat except from a Moosulman butcher; and what must have been at first a violation of their prejudices, has become so confirmed by habit, that they continue it in preference to returning to the orthodox Hindu custom.
Another remarkable case is the fact of Hindus making offerings at the tomb of a Muhammedan saint. At Muckunpoor, about half-way between Khanpoor and Furrukhabad, is the tomb of Shekh Bujioodeen, commonly called Mudar Saheb, at which periodical festivals are held, which are attended much more by the Hindus than the Moosulmans, particularly by the Mahrattas. Had the man been originally a Hindu who became a convert to Islam, particularly if he had been forcibly made a convert, there would be some sort of reason; but, so far from this, he was originally a Jew, who became a Muhammedan, and finally a a saint; and the priests in charge of the tomb, who receive the offerings, are all of that religion. The present race merely follow
