TIBET. 
509 
Nor, in the great variety of visitors that occasionally came to me, did 
I ever perceive the slightest scruple to partake either of tea, or of other 
liquors, as prepared by my own servants. This I notice, as a trait 
diametrically opposite to the unalterable practice of the Hindoos. A 
Brahman would deem it a profanation of the deepest dye, even to eat 
in the presence of one of an inferior cast; much more to partake of the 
same repast, with a person of a different religion. A rigid Hindoo, 
though the most needy of his race, would rather suffer death, than 
submit to such disgrace* 
In nothing, however, does there appear so great a difference, as in 
their religious establishments. 
The religion of the Hindoo, without any acknowledged individual 
superior, and almost without any edifices of magnitude, set apart for 
its professors (at least in Bengal and Hindostan), mixes all alike in the 
common business of the world; and a promiscuous multitude is con¬ 
tinually passing before the eye, among whom no external distinction 
of character can be traced, unless by chance you shall discover that 
sacred and discriminating mark, the Zennar, which is a small cord, 
made of the cusa grass, worn next the skin, passing over the shoulder 
to the hip, by the Brahman only. On such a discovery, I have seen 
a clean and well dressed man, come up to another, who had been em¬ 
ployed as a messenger between two Englishmen, humiliating himself 
before him with profound respect, touching the ground he trod on, and 
even kissing his slipper, after he had been passing through wet and 
dirty roads. Those who are interested in keeping up the illusion, are 
/ 
mixed and blended invariably, with every rank of society: so that the 
