Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 6.djvu/172

 A NAREJA. (314)

HE Nareja is one of the oldest of Sind tribes, and may be found in Lower Sind, Upper Sind, or Khjrpoor. He is petty merchant, cultivator, or Government employé. The subject of the Photograph wears the ordinary employé dress—the peirahun, or muslin shirt, a scarf round the shoulders, and loose shalwars, or trousers, with pointed shoes. Such figures may be seen any day standing by the door of the Hyderabad court-house, or strolling through the bazars and streets of the town. There is no mistaking the ancient Hindoo physiognomy of the class—broad, fat, lethargic, and sensual, and the gait heavy and shambling. The Nareja speaks and reads and writes only Sindee, his native tongue; but he is more ignorant and debased now, perhaps, than his ancestors were as Hindoos, before their conversion to the Mahomedan faith. The Narejas are now Soonnees of the Hunefy sect, but the period of the conversion of the tribe is nowhere mentioned.