1848.] The Turaee and Outer Mountains of Kumaoon. 603 



houses and lands are divided ad infinitum into the most intricate mul- 

 tiplicity of parcels, so small as scarcely to afford a livelihood to the 

 owner, and yet absolutely, necessary to his existence ; emigration being 

 precluded on the one hand by the snows, on the other by the heats of 

 the plains. The result is shown in the extreme anxiety of numbers to 

 obtain employment under Government or with residents of the province, 

 as well as in the amount of litigation and heart-burning concerning 

 boundaries and succession ; yet so pacific and honest are the inhabitants 

 generally, that one travels almost for months without meeting police of 

 any kind, their democratic institutions as to property going hand in 

 hand with the most absolute principles of monarchy and implicit obe- 

 dience. Instead of shooting their landlord, the custom in Tipperary, 

 they merely file a suit against him : it is difficult to meet one who has 

 not some little affair of this kind on hand. The right of primogeniture 

 is only acknowledged to the extent of perhaps a cow, or the most aus- 

 piciously situated tract of land, being given to the eldest son : — daughters 

 appear to get nothing beyond a husband. 



Deo Dhoora occupies the N. E. and highest angle of a great granitic 

 plateau, steep on the east and north, but sloping gently to the west 

 and south : it is covered with wood, and furrowed by deep ravines. 

 One of these commences at the shrine, and soon collects a pretty 

 stream, deeply shaded by horse-chestnut and other trees : at its head 

 is a Noula or covered well, now in process of repair ; the artificers of 

 Kumaoon being all of the outcasts called Dooms or Doomras, no Brah- 

 man, Rajpoot, or man of any good caste will touch the water till the 

 well has been carefully purified by sacrifice and prayers. None of this 

 proscribed race dare openly to drink of a well appropriated to the 

 privileged classes : nor, under the native Governments were they 

 allowed to build temples, to have marriage processions, to mark them- 

 selves with the teeka, all of which they now practise with impunity : and 

 they may console themselves for their exclusion from the springs by 

 the fact that at Almorah the Christians and Musalmans are in precisely 

 the same humiliating category. Against these Helots it may be justly 

 charged indeed that they are in their food, persons, and habitations, 

 disgustingly filthy : scarcely anything comes amiss to them, and they 

 appear indifferent as to whether themselves or disease have the killing 

 of their meat ; fowls, pigs, cows, being equally acceptable. They have 



4 Q 



