Of this American mission, the rev. Mr. Ballantine, in a recent letter, says: “It may interest you to know that, during the ten years ending December, 31st, 1861, we received to the churches, on profession of their faith, 500 persons (not including six persons restored, who had been excommunicated). The number received during the previous twenty years—from the establishment of the mission, in 1831, to the end of 1851-was 171, besides six who came from other places, Two of the men received to this church the past year reside in villages eighteen miles north of Batral, and not far from the Godavery.
One of these, by the name of Bhaoo, was a Manabhav; and he is the first person who has united with the church in this mission from that corious Hindoo sect. The Manabhavs are worshippers of Krishna, end, like the Jains, believe it to be a great sin to take animal life. They go farther than this, and refuse to take vegetable life; and hence the thoroughly-orthodox of this sect will not cultivate the ground; and nothing but the direst necessity will induce them to fell a tree, or even to cut a stalk of grass. They have also most remarkable ideas relative to defilement; as the following incident will show.
Soon after the annual pilgrimage to Trimbuck, fome Manabhavs residing in a village on the Godavery not far from Khokar, suddenly ceased to take water from the river, and went a long distance into the jungle to procure water for drinking, washing, and all culinary purposes. When inquired of as to the reason of this strange procedure, they replied that the pilgrims at Trimbuck had washed away their sins in the Godevery, and that, until the water defiled by them had passed by to the ocean, they would on no account allow the water of the river to touch them.
Bhaoo reads both Marathi and Sanscrit, and was a leading man among the Manabhavs; and therefore his leaning towards Christianity awakened no little opposition. As soon as he declared his purpose to become a Christian, his sons and his wife refused him admission to his own house; and for more than four months the old man was an exile. He, however, bore all his trials without a murmur, and said he was resolved to cast in his lot with the people of God, whatever became of his few worldly possessions. He has recently petitioned government for redress, urging the declaration of her majesty that no person shall forfeit any of his rights by changing his religion. His house has been restored to him; and I trust he will become a burning and shining light.