1865.] Notes of a tour in the Tributary Mehals. ll 
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 obeisance, to bow their 
heads, the Rajah lowered some of them summarily by 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 bwry 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 Juggernath. 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 Beodhists, 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. That 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 hunts 
