Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 3.djvu/122

 IZZUT ALI KHAN. (138)

ZZUT ALI KHAN, the subject of the photograph, is a Mussulman inhabitant of Coel (Allyghur), where his family have dwelt for seven or eight centuries. They are landed proprietors and holders of some rent-free grants conferred by early Mahomedan authorities, on the proceeds of which they live. They profess Mahomedanism, and belong to the Soonnee sect. Then- dispositions and characters resemble those of Mussulmans generally; but one of the members of this family was killed in open rebellion against the Government in 1857. Their diet is mutton, beef, fowl, fish, vegetables, bread, rice, &c.; and they sometimes live to the age of seventy or eighty years. As a general rule, this class of Mahomedans is extremely ignorant, and has not been affected by the educational measures which have been provided by Government, any more than by the local teachers of their own sect. Belonging to the agricultural classes of the population, they have been Hindooized in a great measure, and are in the last degree superstitious; practising, especially their women, Hindoo rites in secret, and believing in the potency of magical charms, &c. Their fidelity as a class is very questionable, and their sympathies are more perhaps with the ancient powers, from whom their present rights are derived, than with those by whom they are perpetuated. It is not improbable that Izzut Ali Khan's family may have been originally Hindoos, perhaps Rajpoots, converted to Mahomedanism. His features are of the ordinary Aryan type of Northern India, and contrast peculiarly with those of the unmistakeable Mahomedan type of the succeeding photograph.

Izzut Ali Khan is fifty years of age, and of average (five feet six inches) height. His complexion is dark, and his eyes black; the beard and hair grey, but dyed black.