30 Notes of a tour in the Tributary Mehals. [No. 1, 



the Raj wars and Kisans I have not yet had an opportunity of study- 

 ing, and shall conclude with a few words about the Khairwars. They 

 are found in many parts of this province but are most numerous and 

 have been longest resident in Palamow. They are said to have 

 migrated from the hills west of Rhotas ; there is a place there, called 

 Kyra, supposed to be named after them, and they are found about the 

 Kymoor hills. The Rajah of Turki in that vicinity is a Khairwar. 

 In this division several of our great men are said to be of Khairwar 

 extraction, but they are all now undergoing that process of being 

 refined into Rajpoots which I have described as likely to have occurred 

 in other families, by intermarriage with Rajpoot maidens. They have 

 to pay very high for the honour, but by giving large dowries with their 

 daughters, they sometimes obtain for them also the distinction of 

 Rajpoot alliances. 



The two races appear to blend well ; a handsomer and more ener- 

 getic stock is the result ; so the aspiring families I allude to, have 

 gained something by their outlay in marriages, as the ordinary or pure 

 Khairwars are generally a dark, ill-favoured race, with coarse features 

 and of lazy unimprovable habits. 



The people called Bhogtahs are a Khairwar ti'ibe. There was a 

 small clan of them in Palamow, who long defied the power of the 

 British Government. They lived on a narrow plateau, with the Sir- 

 goojah mountains behind them, and a range of hills with difficult 

 passes in front of them ; and with the cattle and property of their 

 neighbours, they did very much as they pleased ; and as they had 

 wonderfully contrived retreats amongst the hills and rocks for them- 

 selves and their plunder, they defied all efforts to capture them. At 

 last the wild country they occupied was given to them at a nominal 

 rent, on condition of their living honest and peaceful lives. This kept 

 them quiet for many years, but when the mutinies broke out in 1857, 

 the two chiefs, Lilumber and Pitumber, headed an insurrection in Pala- 

 mow and came to unmitigated grief. One was hanged and the other 

 was transported for life and died in the Andamans. 



The actual income of the Rajah of Sirgoojah from all sources is not 

 more than Rs. 30,000 a year: the estates held by members of his 

 family are worth in addition about Rs. 23,000, and other vassals hold 

 estates worth annually about Rs. 20,000. A fixity of tenure is the 



