38 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. [{N.S., XVIII, 
With extremely few exceptions, none of the existing Catholics, 
who reside in Mofussil villages of Eastern Bengal, make any 
claim to be of European descent : they all freely admit that 
they are descended from either Muhammadans or Hindus. 
The priests unanimously agree that their flocks still follow the 
same customs as their Hindu and Muhammadan neighbours, 
and are only slowly dropping those observances that are not 
in accordance with Christian teaching ; while the emphasis that 
is still laid upon caste bears a Strong resemblance to the 
Indian converts of Antonio del Rozario. We thus arrive at the 
conclusion that the Catholics of Dacca District who have formed 



ctices were retained by Don Antonio’s converts from Hinduism at an 
earlier date, cf. Father M. A. Santucci’s letter to the Rt. Rev. Father 
roz, Patriarch of Ethiopia, dated January 1683—the portions 
he Is 
of relief and incidentally made m nverts. They followed up the 
work of conversion by making provision for the English education of the 
converts’ children; and ultimately a Brahmin’s son passed the B.A 
a 
as served. Hearing this his father became very angry. He said: 
** There was famine and food was not available ; the Padri Saheb gave us 
food and made us Christians. What if we were made Christians! Did we 
give up our caste? Are we like Bengali Christians, eating chicken and 
beef and giving up our caste ?” 
I quote the story below in all the vividness of the original Bengali :— 
sree ALA Givata alsiaq ea) cate NARS ATA M—aewaqcs Ala} AW! 
f Fast ACASCH ECs cae Btelwa Berg WiPSs Seq 1 Seta ceracaae 
Ratey Peta Sta sia cat) aah gracta cara fa, a, ATH Sta | CT BRA 
TH UNS ME cH) cH PLB gata atm aasty za | 
S88 OR Stara Pel awe OBR ata) ferh aaa“ atata Rea, Wie 7 
Nea, ates ANT aifs fea) feaete sfi—fezata aaa S fe gen gfe 
Sife fr) a fe atch feaeta co gah MFI, TF tS, otis faa” 
