THE PEOPLE OF INDIA 215

on the whole less stamina than the Tamil, who, under
favourable circumstances, exhibits fine fighting qualities.
A marked feature in the Southern India population is
the prevalence of Christianity. It is usual for the native
servant in Madras to commence the enumeration of his
many good qualities by the statement that he is, by
religion, “same like master.” The vast majority of
Madras Christians are Roman Catholics, descendants of
those who owed their conversion to the Christian faith
less to the traditional preaching of St. Thomas than to the
more stringent methods employed by the early Portuguese
crusades, which enforced Christianity in the western
districts of India by fire and sword. It is often but 2a
superficial creed, accepted by the uneducated and ignorant
as an intelligible alternative to the unintelligible Hindu
mythology. The Virgin Mary is to them but a beneficent
goddess, and the transition from Krishna to Christ is one
which offers no material difficulty to their limited intellectual
 powers.
But it is good to witness the devotion of the Catholic
priests to their scattered flocks in Southern India. Often
in the early months of summer, when the scorching
breath of the hot wind shrivels the jungle and sends
whirlwinds of dust and dried leaves scudding over the
sun-baked plain, the bullock cart (which is the travelling
residence of the priest) may be found under the shade of
the village banyan tree, and the priest himself, shrivelled,
dried, sun-hatted, cheery, and happy, teaching and ministering
 to his little half-clothed congregation of puzzled
Christian adherents in these depths of darkest India. And
so he will go on teaching and explaining and hoping
for the best till he dies and is buried—when a few sticks
with rags tied to them will decorate his grave, and he will
rank as a departed ‘fakir ” or “yogi.”
With the Tamils and Telegus of the southern provinces
 are associated other Dravidian tribes, more nearly
“aboriginal,” who form no inconsiderable part of the
total population, but who possess no great political or
economic importance. Probably the oldest of these