238 Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [Sept. 



III. — On the Meenas, a ivild tribe of Central India, by Lieutenant - 

 Colonel C. L. Showers. 



(Extract.) 

 [Received, in part, 2nd September, 1867.] 



In considering the present condition of the Aborigines of India and 

 taking it as a test of the character of the rule under which they have 

 subsisted for many generations back, the Government of India neednot, I 

 think, fear comparison with any other Government under which Abori- 

 ginal races have fallen, whether in other British Dependencies or in 

 Foreign States. The existence of the several local corps scattered 

 throughout India, composed of Aboriginal races of various denomina- 

 tions, Bheels, Meenas, &c, and the high state of discipline and fidelity 

 to our Government which some of them have exhibited, testifies at 

 once to the wisdom of the policy pursued by the late rulers of India 

 and to the capacity of wild tribes, albeit heretofore hereditary robbers, 

 for military training and for being reclaimed as true and loyal servants 

 of the Government which knows how to deal with them.* Nor does 

 the process of breaking in take long comparatively. Outram raised 

 the first Bheel Corps, that of Candeish, in 1831. In a few years, the 

 men, weaned from the habits of a life-time as professional plunderers, 

 became, united as a Corps, the main instrument of order in the dis- 

 trict. The Mey war Bheel Corps was raised by Col. Hunter in the 

 year 1841. I saw the first recruits enrolled, naked savages with bows 

 and arrows, fresh from their native hills, which then as yet rang with 

 the shrill khilkee, or Bheel war-cry. In 1850, it fell to my duty as 

 Officiating Political Agent to inspect the corps, when it went through 

 a field-day equal to any native regiment of the line. Again, during 

 the late Mutiny of the Native Army in 1857, this same Bheel corps 

 exhibited remarkable fidelity, operating even against the Mutineer 

 regulars with a total absence of sympathy with them. 



"While one race of Aborigines occupying the western district of the 

 Meywar States were thus being reclaimed from their lawlessnesses and 

 reduced to habits of order and usefulness to our Government, another 



* Akbar appears to have been tho only Muhammadan ruler that tried to 



win over aboriginal tribes by forming them into military Corps. How he 



eeded tuny be seen from the Ain i Akbari (Translation, p, 252). — Tiik 



Bditoe. 



