The date of the Rajputs' appearance in India proper is even more obscure. The Lesser Sind river now marks the eastern boundary of Raj putana, as does the river Indus that to the west, its limits being lat. 23° 15' to 30° N. and long. 30' to 78° 15' E., an area of 123,000 square miles, inhabited by a population of ten millions of souls. The north - eastern Panjab and Cis Sutlej district seems to have first been a Brah man before it became a Rajput country, and subsequently to have been advanced upon by the Jat. The great seat of Rajput population and ancient power and glory was, however, on the Ganges. When vanquished there by the Mu hammadans, after the 12th century, the principal Rajput families retired into the comparatively unfruitful country to which they give their name. But even in Rajputana proper, though it has Rajputs for the dominant race, the population is much more Jat than Rajput, the Jat extending continuously from the Indus to the Ganges. Before the Rajputs were driven back from Ayodhya and the Ganges, Northern Rajputana had been partitioned into small Jat republics, and the Jat still form the most numerous part of the popu lation and possess the largest share in the culti vation, though they share the more open parts with the Mina, the remains of the Saraswati Brahman population, and the dominant Rajput. The southern and more hilly parts of Rajputana are much occupied by the Mina, the Mhair, and the Bhil, and Malwa is occupied by Rajput, Kunbi, and Jat, the Charun and the Bhot races being also there. Rajputs and Jat occupy the plains south of the Salt Range. In the valley of the Ganges, the body of the Rajput population lies next to the Jat race to the east ; in the Middle Doab, Rohilkbaud, and Oudh, and still farther east, the country is shared by a Brahman population. In Lower Rohilkhand, where they are called Thakur, as also in Western Oudh, Rajput com munities are strong and numerous ; in Eastern Oudh, especially on the broad tracts between the Gogra and Ganges, there is a great Rajput popu and they are pretty numerous to the east of Oudh, in Azimghur and Ghazipur. They are also numerous in Mynpuri, Futtehghur, and Etawa ; and Baiswara, the country of the Bais Rajputs, lies almost parallel to the Brahman country of the Lower Doab.
The Gebn, the Jat, Jut, or Jit, and the Takshak, from the Sakatai or Chaghtai region, now occupy places amongst the 36 royal races of Rajputana. The Puranas furnish certain points of information regarding their earliest migrations, and the histories of''Mahmud and Timur acquaint us with their later efforts. They expelled the Greeks who remained after Alexander's departure. • Between the time of Cyrus, six centuries before Christ, when Tomyris fought for independence, and the rise of Timur (A.D. 1330), although twenty centuries had elapsed, the great Getic nation was little circumscribed in power. Under this last prince of the Getic race, Taghalaq Timur Khan, the kingdom of Chaghtai was bounded on the W. by the Dhasht-i-Kipchak, and on the S. by the Jaxartes or Jihun, on which Timur, like Tomyris, had his capital. Kojend, Tashkand, Ootrar, Cyrapolis, and the most northern of the Alexandrian cities, were within the bounds f Chaghtai. The Massagetaa, Getio or Goths,
we'll gradually to have advanced from their ancient hnits into the more fertile districts of Asia, and o have been driven in successive wars across the utlej. They are now spread throughout the Indus •alley, from the mountains of Joud, through Sind, to the shores of Makran, and up to tho valley of the Ganges. They long preserved their ncient habits ; appearing as desultory cavaliers older the Jit leader of Lahore, they made a brave btand for independence against the British under the Jat ruler of Bliurtpur and the successors of Ranjit Singh, while Dholpur state is still Jat. In Bikanir and the Indian desert, in the desert tracts E. and W. of the Indus, they are camel and cattle breeders, but cultivate in the valleys and fertile oases wherever tillage is possible.
The Kathi, another ancient Scythia race, are the ruling tribe in Kattyawar. The Malli and the Katheri of Multan opposed Alexander's advance ; 1300 years afterwards, Mahmud was opposed by a race of the same name, and they must have pre served their ancient spirit to have been so long able to offer a front to the formidable armies of so furious an enthusiast. Their laureate bards still style them ' Lords of Multan and Tatta,' and they repeat couplets descriptive of their emigra tions from Multan, their temporary settlement in the tracts called Pawin, N. of the Bunn, and tell ing of their leader, Megum Rao, conducting the first Kathi colony across the gulf into Saurashtra, eight hundred years ago ; and so predominant was their power, that it changed the ancient name of the Peninsula from Saurashtra to Kathiwar. ' Parsees occupy a prominent place in the W. of India. In the eighth century (A.D. 717), a small body of W. Aryans emigrated from Ormuzd, and landed at Sanjan, 25 miles S. of Damaun. They were a mere remnant of the ancient followers of Zoroaster, and though still few in number (69,000), they have distinguished themselves in W. India by commercial enterprise.
The information regarding the more important immigrations into W. India, as will have been observed, is still so vague as to justify Mr. Elphin stone's remark (i. p. 19), that until Alexander's conquests, the dates of events are all uncertain ; and again, from that time till the Muhammadan invasion, a connected history of this country cannot be given.
A Bactrian dynasty for nearly a hundred years held a considerable portion of the Indus territory, but in the early centuries of the Christian era there was a great upheaving of the nations in India proper. During the khalifat of Umar, history records an expedition from Arabia by the route of Baluchistan. From the eleventh to the eighteenth centuries there were repeated inroads of Moghuls, Turks, Persians, Afghans, and Arabs, led by Mahmud, Timur, Baber, Nadir Shah, and Ahmad Shah. Their military followers seized on kingdoms, provinces, and royalties, and in British India, in 1881, their descendants and those of their converts numbered 50,121,585 souls.