The Ethnology of India. 117 



had a very ancient hold upon them. In the south, the Banijagas are, 

 it appears, now chiefly Lingamites and, as such, scarcely Braminical 

 Hindus. But at one time the Jain form quite prevailed among them. 

 In fact, in all the west and southwest the Jain religion appears to 

 have been at one time predominant. The Jains seem to assert that 

 the Rajpoots were once of their faith, The Pali language and cha- 

 racter would seem especially to belong them. 



What then is the origin of the Banees? That is a very puzzling 

 question. I cannot account for them in any historical way, but the 

 speculation which has occurred to my mind is, whether they may not 

 originally have been immigrants by sea from the west who brought 

 with them the Phallus or Lingam, and those ideas of a continually 

 self-reproducing procreative power which took shape in the worship 

 of Siva, and eventually gave birth to Buddhism and to Jainism, and 

 which finally, meeting and amalgamating with the Braminical faith, 

 produced modern Hinduism. If this be so, we might suppose that 

 the Banees had done much to civilise the Central and South of 

 India, before the Bramins got so far. But, as I have said, this is 

 mere speculation ; much farther inquiry is necessary. 



Among the mercantile classes of the north (as well as of the south) 

 should be classed the well-known Banjaras or wandering grain mer- 

 chants, men of great energy and usefulness in their day. Though 

 they carry on their trade all over the country, they have in some 

 places fixed homes. On the borders of Rohilcund, towards the Terai, 

 they have in fact considerable settlements, are considerable landed 

 proprietors and altogether important people. 



I now come to the Writer classes : — 



The Kaits or Kayasts. 



Important as this caste now is, I am totally at a loss to imagine 

 how or why it came into existence. In old Hindu times, with a great 

 Bramin class occupying something the position which Bramins now 

 hold among the Marattas (by no means confined to sacerdotal duties, 

 but performing all literate functions), one can see no room for a sepa- 

 rate Writer class. If the Rajpoots, coming in. as conquerors, wished to 

 put aside the Bramins, they would probably have found Khatrees and 

 Banees ready to assist them. The Mahommedans, we know, had 



