ne'er-do-wells hanging on to the skirts of the Eurasian society. To all intents and purposes this band is native in instincts, though it clings pathetically to certain European habits and to English speech. Sometimes they call themselves 'poor whites,' although in complexion they are as dark as the natives. It may be doubted some-times if there is any but the remotest drop of alien blood in their veins. They would do better if they were brought up as native Christians and taught to work like the natives. Many of them, although not actually criminal, are sufficiently degraded to bring disgrace upon the Eurasian proper, and, to use one of their own expressions, to 'spoil the name' of the class to which they claim to belong.
The man of mixed blood, who has as much of the European in him as he has of the native, or in whose veins European blood preponderates, is confronted with many difficulties. The wonder is, not that he falls away, but that he follows so closely in the footsteps of his European forbears. Born in the land of his dark ancestors, and brought up under the enervating influences of the country, he struggles nobly to preserve the traditions of the white man's home. He becomes a useful member of the domiciled Anglo-Indian society, and earns an honest living as clerk in one of the many offices, Government or otherwise, that the country offers. He is also an efficient apothecary, assistant-surgeon, school-master, and railway servant. If fortune favours him with a good education in England, he loses almost all trace of his East-Indian breeding—always excepting racial features and complexion which nothing can eradicate—and he becomes a thorough Englishman. He not infrequently fills some distinguished post, showing his ability to compete with the Englishman. The names of many Eurasian gentlemen will live in history.
