XV
INTRODUCTION.
the dried pulse or Indian-corn which the religious ordinances against eating bread away from the hearth on which it is cooked leaves as the sole refreshment for the wayfarer. On the days, generally two in the week, on which bazar is held ;the shade under the trees lining the roadside is occupied by the temporary stalls, where pedlars and grocers display on grass mats spread over the ground their strings of glass beads, brightly coloured bracelets of lac or glass, tobacco (dried for chewing, or mixed up into a paste with sugar for smoking), and a meagre assortment of the commoner kinds of spices and vegetables. What the bazars are for trade the chaupals or village squares are to the political life of the people. In all the larger villages, as a rule, in front of the house of the leading resident zemindar, may be found open spaces where the inhabitants collect after the labours of the day, under the shade of spreading tamarinds or banians, to discuss the local news, the last action of the magistrate, the rent demanded by the landlord, rumours of new taxes or the intentions of a distant government, the price of grain, the weather, the harvest, the health of the neighbourhood. It is there that the collective conduct of the little society, whether to resist or yield to fresh demands, is determined on, and the judgment of tribunals of their caste-fellows is pronounced on offenders against the caste rules which guide every action in life.
In their dwellings, as in their clothes and food, the wants Of a total of of the people are' of the very simplest description. of on an average families shelter about which houses, 2,610,000 four persons each, only 19,400 are of brick, and the majority of these have been erected in the days of their prosperity by the Muhammadan settlers, whose ideas of comfort and luxury are in every way more advanced than those of the old Hindu inhabitants. These brick houses are sometimes very substantial and well built, with one or two upper storeys, surrounding a small square enclosure, into which the dwelling-rooms open through verandahs supported by massive and elaborately carved pillars of salwood. But such are now extremely rare. The ordinary residence of the large area was wealthiest Hindu chief was very different. prickly shrubs, and through bamboo of planted with dense masses centre, surrounded open an on to led which narrow winding paths chief of the himself, family his the On this all>ides by a moat. soldiers, his servants, and a few artizans in iron and wood tenanted a cluster of mud cottages in which the best was hardly-to be disThe example of the late Muhammatinguished from the worst. dan government has encouraged building, and the peace of our
A
