1865.] On the Boksas of Bijnour. 159 
Mr. Batten informs me Boksas have told him, that without wild pigs 
a Boksa would die. This statement has probably something to do 
with their fondness for sporting, but, independent of this, wild pig is 
said to be almost a passion with them. 
The Boksas are undoubtedly restless in their habits, and there 
are more migrations from village to village than would appear to 
be absolutely necessary. Still, this propensity doubtless shows more 
strongly when contrasted with the generally extreme adhesiveness 
of the Hindustani agriculturist to his native village. Here, among 
the western Boksas, there is nothing like the “ Never stay in a 
place more than two years’? which Jones and others state to be 
the case with their eastern confreres. On the contrary, most of the 
former appear never to shift their village at all, and the most exten- 
sive changes going on of late years among them, seem to arise from the 
Government orders to clear the Patli Doon. 
With the minor development of the nomadic instinct, shown by their 
restlessness, they evince unconquerable adhesiveness to their natale 
solum among the swamps and jungles. I could not hear of a single 
instance of a Boksa having emigrated from the forest belt, and they 
mentioned the existence of a tradition that no Boksa had ever gone 
abroad for service. 
Although they are so fond of flesh, they keep no goats or sheep, 
and in only one instance did I find that a few fowls were kept. 
Agriculture may be said to be almost their sole employment, but one 
_ or two others, which are followed by a few of them at times, may be 










here noted. 
A very small number of them ever engage in cutting bamboos 
or timber for export, and the collection of drugs and gums, which 
are largely produced and gathered in the foreSt, affords employment 
to almost none of the tribe. In some parts, however, they collect 
a few of these- (viz..gum of gingan, Odina wodier, .and sohanjan, 
LHyperanthera pterygosperma, kamela powder from the Rottlera 
tinctoria, aorila, fruit of Emblica officinalis, and harra immature 
fruit of Terminalia chebula) for sale to the bunyas, who come-hither to 
buy such things. I have already here mentioned, that the collection 
of the kino of the dhak they object to as being too laborious, and 
probably we must attribute to sheer laziness the fact, that they do so 
