150 On the Boksas of Bijnour. [No. 3, 
from twenty to at least two or three hundred in one or two of 
them. Having found out the exact number of persons in a few 
families, and made a good many inquiries, about most of the villages, 
bearing on the point of population, I should put down the total 
number of Boksas in this tract as at least two thousand, and possibly 
nearer three thousand. 
Of the fifteen villages, eleven were visited. All are built on 
the same plan of one straight street generally of considerable width 
(in some cases as much as forty to fifty feet) and kept very clean, 
in both respects, differing remarkably from the ordinary villages 
of the plains. The huts are placed end to end with intervals after 
every group of three or four, and the walls are, for the most part, built 
of wattle (of split bamboo) and dab, but sometimes of chhuppar, of 
which latter the roofs also are constructed. The houses are window- 
less, but each has a door in front and another behind, the latter 
affording access to the sheds for cattle, &c. The doorways and roofs 
are very low, and the floors of beaten earth are considerably raised 
above the general level of the ground, and are kept scrupulously clean. 
The only “ furniture’ in the houses, besides an occasional charpdi, or 
more frequently small chhappars (which are often used to sleep on, as 
cheaper than the former), consists of a few cooking vessels and one or two 
barrel-shaped utensils three or four feet high and fully as much round, 
made of wattle and dab, and used for storing grain. 
There is no change made in the houses or household arrangements 
during the rains, so that these western Boksas do not at any time 
“live in houses built on poles,” as is stated to be the case with those 
opposite Kumaon. ¥ 
The members of the tribe are of short stature and very spare 
in habit, in both respects, somewhat exceeding the ordinary Hindoo 
peasant of the district, from whom, however, they do not differ 
much in general build or in complexion. No measurements of 
their crania were made, but so far as ordinary inspection goes, their 
features are marked by several of the Turanian peculiarities. Thus, — 
the eyes are small, the opening of the eyelids being narrow, linear and — 
horizontal (the inner angle not inclined downwards so far as I observ- 
ed), the face is very broad across the cheekbones, and the nose is 
depressed, thus increasing the apparent flatness of the face, the jaw is ; 

