Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 7.djvu/75

KOORMEES. multiply, till they now include about 38 per cent. of the local Hindoo population; for, besides the Koormees, several classes of agriculturists, with weavers and others, have joined it. The followers of the sect are prohibited from eating flesh or drinking spirits, or smoking tobacco, and they do not profess caste, though they adhere to the classes into which they are divided, and intermarry with them only. Grant's Gazetteer, article "Bilaspoor," contains much interesting information regarding the local sects of the province, to which we must refer our readers, being too long for extract here.