THE SAL EOEESTS. 359 



remains of their forts and other buildings still crown in 

 crumbling decay the top of many a forest-covered mound. 

 I think it very doubtful if any part of the interior was ever 

 colonized further than by the scattered religious settlements 

 of the advancing Aryans in early times. The wide open 

 valleys of deep soil are now utterly untilled ; while the hills 

 are scantily occupied by aboriginal races, who subsist in the 

 primitive and destructive manner, by cutting and burning 

 the jungle, described in Chapter III., on the Puchmurree 

 Hills. 



The Gonds are here a very poor and subdued race, long 

 since weaned from their wild notions of freedom, with its 

 attendant hardships and seclusion ; but still unreached by 

 the influence of the general advancement which has in some 

 measure redeemed them in most parts from their state of 

 practical serfdom to the superior races. .They usually plough 

 with cattle, instead of depending on the axe, and are nearly 

 all hopelessly in debt to the money-lenders, who speculate in 

 the produce they raise. There is no local market, and the 

 difficulty of exporting grain over the seventy or eighty miles 

 of atrocious road to the open country is such that the prices 

 obtained for their produce are contemptible. They congre- 

 gate in filthy little villages, overrun by poultry and pigs, and 

 innocent of all attempt at conservancy. 



Far superior to them in every respect are the still utterly 

 unreclaimed forest Bygds, another aboriginal race, whose 

 habitat is in the hills of the Mykat range and its spurs, 

 which intersect these valleys. The same tribe extends over 

 a vast range of forest-covered country to the west of Mandld,, 

 where we shall subsequently meet them again under the name 

 of Bhumi^s ; and in all this country they number no more 

 than about eighteen thousand souls. A few of these have 



