called the Adi Grunth. They were at first called Sikh (disciple), and were a peaceable sect, until persecuted, on which Gooroo Govind, their tenth high-priest, changed their names to Singh (lion), and invited them to resist oppression, and become a warlike people. They ultimately grew into a nation, and obtained possession of the whole of the Punjab, but were divided into a multitude of petty principalities without any recognised head. As a remedy for this, on any occasion where the general safety was endangered, a grand council, called a Gooroomata, was assembled to deliberate, at which all were required to eat together: as the Sikhs include every tribe of Hindus, and many Muhammedans, caste must, of course, have been annihilated. Yet these people are gradually now sliding back into Hinduism, and again adopting the peculiarities of caste. A Sikh, the descendant of a Brahmin, will no more eat with one whose ancestors were of low caste, than a Hindu Brahmin will with a sweeper. So strong is this feeling becoming, that it would probably prevent the assembly of the Gooroomata, should such be attempted: yet outcasts, as all Sikhs must, strictly speaking, be, many tribes of Hindus, even of the higher castes, such as Rajpoots, intermarry with them.
These, and numerous instances of a similar nature, might be quoted, completely disproving the notion that persons who have forfeited their caste become such outcasts that even their parents dare not speak to them, except by stealth,—as asserted by Ward.
There is also a great deal of very convenient latitude on the subject of caste. If a man can persuade a considerable number to join him, he will do a great many things which he dared not have been guilty of alone. Strictly speaking, the Hindu sepoys who have gone on foreign expeditions by sea, have all lost caste; but who dare tell them so? They form too strong a party for any one to presume to hint at it, much less act upon the idea. On service, they make no scruple of drinking from a Bheestee’s (Muhammedan water-carrier) leathern water-bag, which they would never do on ordinary occasions:—sometimes they will even go further. During the attack of a fort on a hot day, two officers had procured a large earthen pot, full of water, out of
