336 Major-General John Briggs on the 



2d, The priesthood, derived entirely from Bramans. 



3c?. The mercantile and mechanical tribes or families. 

 • 4ith. The cultivator or landholder. 



As has been stated, these castes never intermarried, and 

 thus kept themselves free from any admixture with any other 

 race. 



The Hindus burn their dead. They abstain from eating 

 the flesh of horned cattle, and from tasting ardent spirits. 

 They believe in the transmigration of souls, give themselves 

 up wholly to the guidance of the Bramanical priesthood, and 

 are taught to worship their ancient heroes as demigods, who 

 are supposed to plead with the supreme God for those who 

 in humility ask in repentance. 



The aboriginal races, one and all, differ in every respect 

 from the Hindus. Their government is strictly patriarchal ; 

 all crimes are punished and disputes settled by the award of 

 the elders or heads of tribes assembled. They have no pre- 

 judices against animal food of any kind, whether the animal 

 be slaughtered, or die a natural death. They have no muni- 

 cipalities ; have no laws of caste ; they bury instead of burn- 

 ing their dead. They have no regular priests, but select 

 them for the moment, as necessity requires, out of the lay 

 body. These are chosen usually from those believed to possess 

 the power of magic. They have no other knowledge of a future 

 state than what they occasionally pick up from their inter- 

 course with Hindus or with other people. Instead of oifering 

 up thanksgivings with a grateful heart for all the blessings 

 they may enjoy, they confine their prayers to requests from the 

 divinity to gratify their desires, supply their wants, and avert 

 evil. For these purposes they offer up bloody sacrifices. In 

 those parts still unsubdued, such as a great part of Gond- 

 wana and the contiguous tracts of Goomser and Bus tar, and 

 in some portion of the country lying further eastward among 

 the Assam hills, they continue to make human sacrifices, a 

 practice to which these races have been prone, according to 

 Hindu records, from the earliest ages. 



Their offerings are made to the god of the elements, of 

 floods, and of the soil ; they propitiate the goddesses of con- 

 tagious and epidemic diseases. They also worship power in 



