Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review Volumes 32 and 33.djvu/638

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328 Reviezvs.

The Tribes and Castes of Bombay. By R. E. Enthoven, CLE. Three volumes. Bombay. 1920-22.

Mr. Enthoven's volumes on the ethnography of Bombay practically complete the work of the Ethnographic Survey of India. The only provinces for which memoirs remain to be published are the Native State of Haidarabad, and Rajputana. A complete survey of the Rajput tribes is much to be desired, but there seems no chance of its publication for the present. Mr. Enthoven is w^ell knowm as on© of the band of Bombay scholars, including the late Mr. A. M. T. Jackson, Mr. D. R. Bhandarkar, and Mr. B. A. Gupte, who have done so much to advance our knowledge of the religions, history, archaeology, and sociology of Western India ; and since the publication of his excellent Report on the Census of the Presidency in 1901, he has pursued the studies of which the present work is the result. He started with the great advantage of being able to draw upon the stores of materials contained in the famous Gazetteer of the Province, edited by that great scholar, Sir James Campbell, which have been supplemented by Mr. Enthoven's enquiries, assisted by many local workers and caste committees, by whom the draft memoirs prepared by Mr. Enthoven have been revised and extended. The work now published is of the highest importance, and deserves the special attention of all those interested in the peoples of India.

It is possible here to call attention only to some of the more important results of the survey. For the Musalmans it is interesting to note that contact with the Muhammadan invaders has left its influence in the greater freedom with which inter- marriage is allowed. Much information is given on the subject of Totemism, the Maratha Devaks, or guardians, and the Bahs or " shoots " of Kanara, with the result that the connexion of these races is found to be closer than was hitherto believed. The power exercised by the earlier Rajas in matters of caste has led to the creation of new sub-castes which crystallise local variances of custom. Here, as elsewhere, the fusion of the various groups has produced uniformity in the population. " Ultimately we may perhaps be prepared to the conclusion