9d The Ethnology of India. 



his territory. The Boondeelas of Bundlecuncl are not, I believe, con- 

 sidered to he very pure Rajpoots ; they have probably suffered some 

 intermixture, but they are notoriously bold and martial, form a domi- 

 nant aristocracy, and used to be very troublesome to us. I do not 

 know the proportion of Rajpoot population in Scindia's territories to 

 the west, but believe that it is numerous. In Malwa, Rajpoots of the 

 Rahtore, Chouhan, Sesodya and other clans form a large proportion of 

 the population, and all the surrounding hilly country which is not 

 held by pure Aborigines seems to have been from very old times in 

 the possession of Rajpoot or semi-Rajpoot chiefs. The Mewar or 

 Godeypore Rajpoots, occupying a strong and elevated country in the 

 west, claim to be the most ancient of the race ; and I have seen it 

 stated that some of the western Rajpoots are comparatively fair, with 

 light or grey eyes. If so, that would seem to indicate that they 

 reached their present location by a direct route from the west, and 

 not by doubling back from the Granges, as is supposed to have been 

 the case in northern Rajpootana. 



In the history of G-uzerat the Rajpoots are very famous, and many 

 of them seem to have been of the same high-caste tribes whose blood 

 is reputed the best in the east, the Waghels, for instance, being (it 

 appears) the same as the Baghels. They are evidently still numerous, 

 but I have not been able to ascertain what proportion of the popula- 

 tion they form, and to what extent they take part in the actual cul- 

 tivation. Forbes does not speak of them as if they were among the 

 most numerous cultivators. 



In Kathywar, Rajpoots seem to be numerous, and from the practice 

 of infanticide we may suppose that they consider themselves high- 

 caste, but I cannot exactly make out whether the Kathis are counted 

 as Rajpoots, or whether the many petty chiefs of Kathywar are prin- 

 cipally Kathis or proper Rajpoots. The Kathis seem to have been 

 undoubtedly immigrants from the west and at one time neighbours 

 and allies of Jats. 



In Lower Scinde there are undoubted traces of ancient Rajpoot 

 rule, and the Summa Rajpoots ruled more recently under the Mahom- 

 medan emperors. Farther west, in Beloochistan, there seem to be 

 traces of Hindu rule of a character more orthodox than that of the 

 Jats, but whether the Rajpoots ever had dominion there, I am unable j 

 to say. 



