Tempo:
HISTORY OF THE SIKHS
14
The unmixed
Rajputs.
The Tibetans plodding and
debased.
The custom of
polyandry
one of necessity.
The Juns
and Kathis
pastoral
and
peaceful.
CHAP.
I
of the hills south and east of Kashmir are not marked
by any peculiar and well-determined character, excepting that the few unmixed Rajputs possess the personal
courage and the pride of race which distinguish them
elsewhere, and that the Gakhars still cherish the
remembrance of the times when they resisted Babar
and aided Humayun. The Tibetans, while they are
careful cultivators of their diminutive fields rising tier
upon tier, are utterly debased in spirit, and at present
they seem incapable of independence and even of
resistance to gross oppression. The system of polyandry
obtains among them, not as a perverse law, but as a
necessary institution. Every spot of ground within the
hills which can be cultivated has been under the plough
for ages; the number of mouths must remain adapted
to the number of acres, and the proportion is preserved
by limiting each proprietary family to one giver of
children. The introduction of Muhammadanism. in the
west, by enlarging the views of the people and promoting emigration, has tended to modify this rule, and even
among the Lamaic Tibetans any casual influx of wealth
as from trade or other sources, immediately leads to
the formation of separate establishments by the several
members of a house.^ The wild tribes of Chibs and
Buhows in the hills, the Juns and Kathis, and the Dogras and Bhutis of the plains, need not be particularly
described; the idle and predatory habits of some, and
the quiet pastoral occupations of others, are equally
the result of position as of character. The Juns and
Kathis, tall, comely, and long-lived races, feed vast
herds of camels and black cattle, which furnish the
towns with the prepared butter of the east, and provide
the people themselves with their loved libations of
milk.-
Regarding the polyandry of Ladakh, Moorcroft (Travels,
may be referred to, and also the Journal of the
Asiatic Society of Bengal for 1844, p. 202, &c. The effects of the
system on bastardy seem marked, and thus out of 760 people
in the little district of Hungrung, around the junction of the
Sutlej and Pittee (or Spiti) rivers, there were found to be
twenty-six bastards, which gives a proportion of about one in
twenty-nine; and as few grown-up people admitted themselves
to be illegitimate, the number may even be greater.
In 1835
the population of England and Wales was about 14,750,000 and
the number of bastards aflfiliated (before the new poor law
came into operation) was 65,475, or 1 in about 226 (Wade's
British History, pp. 1041-55); and even should the number so
born double those affiliated, the proportion would still speak
agair.-t polyandry as it affects female purity.
- On milk sustained, and blest with length of days,
The Hippomolgi, peaceful, just, and wise.
Iliad, xiii. Cowper's Translation.
1
ii.
321, 322)
14
The unmixed
Rajputs.
The Tibetans plodding and
debased.
The custom of
polyandry
one of necessity.
The Juns
and Kathis
pastoral
and
peaceful.
CHAP.
I
of the hills south and east of Kashmir are not marked
by any peculiar and well-determined character, excepting that the few unmixed Rajputs possess the personal
courage and the pride of race which distinguish them
elsewhere, and that the Gakhars still cherish the
remembrance of the times when they resisted Babar
and aided Humayun. The Tibetans, while they are
careful cultivators of their diminutive fields rising tier
upon tier, are utterly debased in spirit, and at present
they seem incapable of independence and even of
resistance to gross oppression. The system of polyandry
obtains among them, not as a perverse law, but as a
necessary institution. Every spot of ground within the
hills which can be cultivated has been under the plough
for ages; the number of mouths must remain adapted
to the number of acres, and the proportion is preserved
by limiting each proprietary family to one giver of
children. The introduction of Muhammadanism. in the
west, by enlarging the views of the people and promoting emigration, has tended to modify this rule, and even
among the Lamaic Tibetans any casual influx of wealth
as from trade or other sources, immediately leads to
the formation of separate establishments by the several
members of a house.^ The wild tribes of Chibs and
Buhows in the hills, the Juns and Kathis, and the Dogras and Bhutis of the plains, need not be particularly
described; the idle and predatory habits of some, and
the quiet pastoral occupations of others, are equally
the result of position as of character. The Juns and
Kathis, tall, comely, and long-lived races, feed vast
herds of camels and black cattle, which furnish the
towns with the prepared butter of the east, and provide
the people themselves with their loved libations of
milk.-
Regarding the polyandry of Ladakh, Moorcroft (Travels,
may be referred to, and also the Journal of the
Asiatic Society of Bengal for 1844, p. 202, &c. The effects of the
system on bastardy seem marked, and thus out of 760 people
in the little district of Hungrung, around the junction of the
Sutlej and Pittee (or Spiti) rivers, there were found to be
twenty-six bastards, which gives a proportion of about one in
twenty-nine; and as few grown-up people admitted themselves
to be illegitimate, the number may even be greater.
In 1835
the population of England and Wales was about 14,750,000 and
the number of bastards aflfiliated (before the new poor law
came into operation) was 65,475, or 1 in about 226 (Wade's
British History, pp. 1041-55); and even should the number so
born double those affiliated, the proportion would still speak
agair.-t polyandry as it affects female purity.
- On milk sustained, and blest with length of days,
The Hippomolgi, peaceful, just, and wise.
Iliad, xiii. Cowper's Translation.
1
ii.
321, 322)
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