1865.] Notes of a tour in the Tributary Mehals. 11 



According to their tradition, they are called Agureahs from having, 

 ages ago, come from Agra. 



They were a proud Cshettrya or Khettree family, a stiff-necked 

 generation, and refusing, when making an oheisance, to how their 

 heads, the Rajah lowered some of them summarily hy cutting them 

 off. They therefore left Agra and wandered south through Central 

 India till they came to Sumbulpore, and eventually settled in these 

 regions. Acquiring lands, and determining to devote themselves 

 entirely to the tilling of the soil, they divested themselves of their 

 " paitas" making them over to the Brahmins, and no longer styling 

 themselves or being styled Khettrees, they became known as Aguriahs. 



They bury their dead, and for this departure from the usual custom 

 of Hindus, they can assign no specific cause, but that they gave up 

 the practice of incremation when they resigned their pretensions to be 

 esteemed Khettrees. They nevertheless now profess to be Vishnoovis, 

 divided into two denominations, ' Ramanundyas' and ' Kubeer pun- 

 thees.' The Vishnoovi doctrines they have probably taken up, since 

 their migration to tracts bordering on Orissa and approximating the 

 great fane of Juggernatlx. They say they gave up the worship of 

 Kali when they resigned their ' paitas' and took to the plough. It is 

 probable that they were Boodhists, obliged to leave the Gangetic pro- 

 vinces for refusing to conform to Brahminism. 



Their physique decidedly supports the - tradition of their Khettri 

 extraction : they are distinguished amongst the dark, coarse-featured 

 aborigines of this country, as a tall, fair, well-made and handsome race, 

 resembling the Rajpoots in every thing but swagger. TJiat went with' 

 the ' paitas,' as a farewell offering to Kali. The women, who are not 

 very jealously secluded, have good features and figures, and a neat and 

 cleanly appearance. 



The latter are subjected to no field labour, their sole business being to 

 look after the domestic arrangements, to gin cotton and to spin. They 

 do not weave. Their spun thread is made over to the weavers, who 

 are paid in kind for their labour. Their villages, laid out in streets, are 

 comparatively well kept, and their own houses in these villages sub- 

 stantial, clean, and comfortable. Munguspore, near the Sumbulpore 

 boundary, is, I think, the largest. It contains 200 houses, those of 

 the Aguriahs occupying the centre of the village, surrounded by huts 



