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To-day nearly eleven millions of men, forming about half the entire population of the Bombay Presidency (minus its unnatural adjunct, Sindh), speak Marathi, and another nine millions living in the Central Provinces, the Nizam's Dominions, and other parts, claim the same language as their mother-tongue.* This language has been steadily gaining ground since the days of the Peshwas, and its peaceful annexation of the children of ruder and less literary tongues has gone on unabated even during the British period.

But the Maratha country is not coextensive with the land where the Marathi speech prevails to-day.