Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 6.djvu/211

 LOHANA AMILS. (323)

THE SAME. (323-2)

N the thirteenth chapter of his ''History of Sind—and Notes on its Population. Records of Government.'' 1847—Captain Burton draws a very unfavourable character of these persons, who held office under the Ameers as manners of provinces, and in other administrative capacities; but the account of their manners and customs supplies some interesting particulars from which the following description of the caste is supplied:—

The Lohanas belong to the Vaishya or mercantile class of Hindooism, which is the third in the scale of dignity which comprises the main body of Hindoos now in Sind. They wear the sacred thread, and are Hindoos; but residence of many descents in a foreign land, for it can hardly be hereditary custom, has changed their caste greatly. The Lohana eats meat, drinks spirits, and has no objection to fish and onions. The Lohana Amils eat the same meat as the Sarsudh Brahmins, buy flesh from the Mussulmans as it is unlawful for them to kill anything, and drink water from the hands of inferiors in caste. Their marriages are expensive: they seldom take more than one wife, unless she proves barren, and they often marry late in life, owing to the great expense of marriage ceremonies. Nor is there any positive objection to the marriage of widows; should a girl become a widow early in life, her husband's eldest brother usually marries her; but this custom is not universal.

The Lohana Amil has not much education, he can read and write the very indifferent Persian, interlarded with Sindee, which he speaks. He can keep accounts; and in the time of the Ameers, the tribe were indispensable servants as rulers of districts, settlers and collectors of revenue. &c.: and though despised as kafirs, or unbelievers, nevertheless throve under the necessities of their employers.