178 Notes on Moorcroft's Travels in Ladakh, [No. 147. 



Race, fyc. — The Kunawarees are of the Caucasian race, that is, they 

 are not characterized by the broad features of the Tibetans, and may be 

 of Hindoo origin, as they claim to be; but Brahminism has not yet ob- 

 tained a mastery among them, and they are more tinged with the man- 

 ners and religion of Tibet than with those of India. They know little 

 or nothing of their own history, but they are most likely colonists, and 

 they have still among them a separate race regarded as inferior. The 

 people though possessed of some spirit are not warlike, they are peaceful 

 agriculturists, and not a race of robbers. Crimes of great atrocity are 

 rare, nor can it be said, that those which affect property are common. 

 Compared with the people of the plains of India, they may be termed a 

 simple race, without supposing them unimbued with the ordinary evil 

 passions of our nature, as might be inferred from descriptions of some 

 travellers. 



Government. — Kunawar is the largest subdivision of the Bissehir 

 principality. The chief is absolute, but here as elsewhere, he must be 

 guided by immemorial usage. The district is managed by hereditary 

 superintendents or viziers, who collect the revenues which are fixed, 

 and levied chiefly in cash, but partly in kind. Each village has its 

 head man responsible for its good behaviour. The lands are divided 

 among a certain number of families, and each house, besides the taxes, 

 provides the Raja with a soldier, and also with a servant or porter 

 when required. 



The Bissehir principality had for ages subsisted as independent, 

 carrying on occasional wars with the adjacent states of Kulu, Ladakh, 

 Chaprang and Garhwal ; but it yielded to the Gorkhas, and on the con- 

 clusion of our war with the Nepalese, it became a British dependency. 

 It pays to the Indian Government a tribute of rupees 15,000 annually ; 

 the revenues of the principality have been recently estimated at 

 1,40,000 rupees. 



Religion. — In northern Kunawar, Buddhistic Lamaism is preva- 

 lent, but in the middle and south, the people are left to their local 

 gods, and to the oracular priests of these divinities. Every hill is sup- 

 posed to be the abode of a deo'td, who owns the undefined power of 

 some mighty Being above all. 



Social relations. — The Kunawarees are all Polyandrists, i. e. one 

 house or family has usually but one wife only, and she is considered 



