1865.] On the Boksas of Bijnovr. 153 



habits, &c., and that they had come from the Dakkan, hut even in this 

 they were not unanimous. When they came to details, and many 

 professed to know none, their statements were more varied than 

 satisfactory. Thus, several of them agreed that they came from 

 Dlutranaggari, which, however, one man declared was close to Kangra 

 Devi. One stated that they came from Delhi, and another that they 

 had been driven from their original home in the Dakkan by the 

 Marhattas; one pudlidn stated that they came from Chittorgurh, 

 " beyond Delhi" in the wars of the old Rajas, and the most intelligent 

 pudlidn of all, the only man among them that I met who could read, 

 affirmed that they originally came from " Boondee Kolah" having been 

 exiled thence " by the king." On this subject I found the three puro^ 

 hits quite as ignorant as the members of their flocks. 



A still more curious statement, than any of these was made by an 

 intelligent old Bengali Baboo, who has held a village in the Boksa 

 district for many years. He solemnly affirmed that, before the com- 

 mencement of British rule, the Boksas were Mussulmans in faith and 

 ceremonials, and that, in his time, they had Hosseini Brahmins as puro- 

 hits, and used verses of the Koran in their puja. This is a very 

 suspicious story, at the same time it is difficult to see what motive the 

 man could have had in narrating it. 



It is not easy to reconcile the clear statements made to Elliot, 

 especially regarding the origin of the tribe, with the above discordant 

 and fragmentary information which alone is current among the western 

 Boksas, and the explanation of the difficulty may be the following. 

 If the story about Oodya Jeet is the true one, it would be more likely 

 to be retained by the numerous and concentrated Boksas to the east 

 of the Ramganga, than by the few and scattered members of the tribe 

 to the west. Or, if that tradition is, as there seems reason to suspect, 

 a mere concretion, resulting possibly from the original conversion of 

 the tribe by Rajputs, and their centuries of contact with Hindoo castes 

 and traditions, it may, in a similar way, have more readily assumed a 

 definite form, where the tribe was most numerous and united. 



Still less than my inclination to theorize definitely, are my quali- 

 fications to dogmatize on such a subject, but the suspicion has 

 grown on me, since commencing inquiries regarding these people, 

 that their origin may be very different from what has ordinarily 

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