racters enlist themselves as such, and prowl about the streets, extorting unwilling charity. Several causes have tended to bring about this state of circumstances. The natural fertility of the land leading to an abundance of produce, labour is held cheap, as the means of supporting life are found without difficulty. The religion and manners of the people inculcating charity as a virtue of the first order, there are not wanting idle men to avail themselves of the pretence; and so we have different organized bands of mendicants, who regularly feed and fatten upon public alms. In fact, the success of these men is so great, that we do not wonder to see men, who were labourers at one time, turn into regular beggars. The Byragees, Bostoms, and Synnashees, who infest the streets of Calcutta, are a great nuisance to the people of the metropolis. Besides these, we have regular frequenters of marriages, shrauds, and festivals of all kinds, who are such sturdy villains, that they do not scruple to use every means, persuasion, intreaty, threat, and abuse, by turns, for the purpose of extortion. Brahmins are found in greater proportion among beggars than any other caste of men; and when such a wretch besets us, it is not until after he has exhausted every term in the beggar's vocabulary, be it to persuade, to soften, or to threat, to bring down blessings on the head of us and ours, or to shower down curses and damnation, that he will leave us.-Gyananneshun, April 6, 1836.

Infanticide.-The Calcutta Christian Observer for November, 1835, contains a statement of the efforts (hitherto but partially successful) made by an active and benevolent public officer (Col. Pottinger) in the province of Cutch, to put down female infanticide:

"When he first came to Cutch, ten years ago, he set out, with all the active zeal of a new comer, to root out the practice; but he soon discovered his mistake. The mehtahs sent at his request, by the then regency, were either cajoled by false returns, or expelled from towns and villages, not only by the classes charged with the crime, but by the other inhabitants, whom long habit had taught to view the business with indifference, if not absolute approbation. Col. P. next got the darbár to summon all the Jarejahs to Bhúj, and partly by threats, and partly persuasion, arranged with them to furnish quarterly statements of the births within their respective estates. This plan he saw, from the outset, was defective; but it was the best he could hit upon at the moment. It proved, however, an utter failure. Within six months, most of the Jarejahs declared their inability to act up to their agreement, even as far as regarded their nearest relations. Several fathers, for instance, assured him, that they dared not establish such a scrutiny regarding their grown-up sons; and the few statements that were furnished, he found to have been drawn by guess-work, from what may be termed the tittle-tattle of the village.

Col. P.'s next idea was, that as all the Jarejahs profess to be blood relations of the Rao of Cutch, they might be requested to announce to him, as the head of the tribe, as well as Government, the fact of their wives being 'enceintes,' and eventually the result. This scheme appeared feasible to the ministers; but when it was proposed to the Jarejah members of the regency, they received it with feelings of complete disgust, and almost horror. Two modes further suggested themselves of carrying the object. The one, to use direct authority and force; but that would, no doubt, be at variance with the spirit, if not the letter, of the treaty. The other, to grant a portion to every Jarejah girl on her marriage. This latter method had been proposed to the Bombay Government by Col. P.'s predecessor (Mr. Gardiner), but had been explicitly negatived, and that negative had been confirmed by the Court of Directors. Under these circumstances, the plan was, of course, abandoned.

"Sir John Malcolm came to Bhúj in March, 1820. He made a long speech to the assembled Jarejahs on the enormity of the crime, and told them, the English nation would force the East-India Company to dissolve all connexion with a people who persisted in it! The Jarejahs, of course, individually denied the charge; but they afterwards inquired from Col. P., how the Governor could talk so to them, at a moment when he was courting the friendship of Sinde, in which child

murder is carried to a much greater extent than even in Cutch; for it is a well-known fact, that all the illegitimate offspring born to men of any rank, in that country, are indiscriminately put to death, without reference to sex. Subsequently to Sir John's visit, an impostor, of the name of Vijjya Bhat, went to Bombay, and presented a petition to Government, setting forth Col. P.'s supineness, and offering, if furnished with some peons, to do all that was required. This petition was referred to the colonel to report on, which he did as it merited; and matters lay in abeyance, till the young Rao was installed in July, 1834, when he adopted the most decided steps to enforce that article of the treaty which provides for the suppression of infanticide. He took a paper from the whole of his brethren, reiterating that stipulation, and agreeing to abide the full consequences if they broke it. Col. P. officially promised the Rao the support of the British Government in all his measures, and the Rao and the English resident have been watching ever since for an occasion to make a signal example; but the difficulty of tracing and bringing home such an allegation will be understood from the preceding account; and it would be ruin to the cause to attempt to do so on uncertain grounds, and fail. It now, however, appears that our best, perhaps only, chance of success rests with the Rao, who is most sincere in his detestation of the crime, and his wish to stop it.

"Our correspondent proceeds as follows:

"The assertion made by Mr. Wilkinson, that infanticide is carried to an extent of which we have hardly yet a complete notion, is, alas! too true in India. The Rao of Cutch told the resident at his court, very recently, that he had just found out, that a tribe of Musalmáns, called Summas, who came originally from Sinde, and now inhabit the islands in the Runn, paying an ill-defined obedience to Cutch, put all their daughters to death, merely to save the expense and trouble of rearing them! He has taken a bond from all the heads of the tribe to abandon the horrid custom; but, as he justly remarked, he has hardly the means of enforcing it. Of the origin of infanticide in Cutch, it is difficult to give a satisfactory account. The tradition of its being a scheme hit on by one of the Jarejahs, to prevent their daughters, who cannot marry in their own tribe, from disgracing their families by prostitution, is generally received. The Jarejahs of Cutch have adopted all the vices, whilst they have few or none of the saving qualities, of the Musalmáns. No people appear to have so thorough a contempt for women; yet, strange to say, we often see the dowagers of households taking the lead in both public and private matters amongst them. Their tenets are, however, that women are innately vicious; and it must be confessed that they have good cause to draw this conclusion in Cutch, in which, it is