against him for even
thinking of breaking Caste, and would not listen to him. Still he
waited, and witnessed to them, not fearing anything. Then one day,
suddenly some men rushed into the room where he was sitting, seized and
bound and gagged him. They forced something into his mouth as he lay on
the floor at their mercy; he feared it was a drug, but it was only some
disgusting stuff which, to a Hindu, meant unutterable defilement. Then
they left him bound alone, and at night he managed to escape. A few
months after he told us this, we heard he had been seized again, and
this time "drugged and done for."

In South India baptism does not prevent the Caste from using every
possible means to get the convert back; once back, certain ceremonies
are performed, after which he is regarded as purified, and reinstated in
his Caste. The policy of the whole Caste confederation is this: get him
back unbaptised if you can, but anyhow _get him back_. Two Brahman lads
belonging to different parts of this district decided for Christ, went
through all that is involved in open confession, and were baptised. One
of the two was sent North for safety; his people traced him, followed
him, turned up unexpectedly at a wayside station in Central India, and
forced him back to his home in the South. Once there, they took their
own measures to keep him. The other lad was sent to Madras. The Brahmans
found out where he was, broke into the house at night, overpowered the
boy's protectors, and carried him off. They too did what seemed good to
them there, and they too succeeded. No one outside could interfere. The
Caste guards its own concerns.

"O Lord Jesus Christ!" wrote one, a Hindu still, "who knowest us to be
placed in such danger that it is as if we were within some magical
circle drawn round us, and Satan standing with his wand without, keeping
us in terror, break the spell of Satan, and set us free to serve Thee!"

All this may be easy reading to those who are far away from the place
where it happened. Distance has a way of softening too distinct an
outline; but it is not easy to write, it comes so close to us. Why write
it, then? We write it because it seems to us it should be more fully
known, so that men and women who know our God, and the secret of how to
lay hold upon Him, should lay hold, and hold on for the winning of the
Castes for Christ.

[Illustration: Another Brahman, much duller than the last. This and the
two preceding photo