Note 1 — Social and Domestic Life

Crops, &c. Rice, roughly classified as the larger and the smaller grains (maimá and maisá), is here, as elsewhere, the chief object of the peasant’s skill and labour; but other crops are not wanting, e.g., pulse, gathered in December, cotton, sugar-cane in limited quantities, tobacco, &c. Of this last-mentioned article there are two distinct varieties commonly grown, i.e., country tobacco and Burmese1 (Mán) tobacco, the latter commanding the higher price in the market. All surplus produce finds a ready sale among the ever-growing numbers of imported labourers on tea estates, many of whom are consumers of Kachári rice-beer or less harmless liquors, and who in consequence fraternise readily with their Kachári neighbours. In this way the average Bodo peasant is a very well-to-do person in worldly things, the more so because the Kachári labourer is in great demand as a factory worker. Where there are three or four brothers in a family in Western Assam, it is quite usual for one, perhaps two, of the number to remain at home to cultivate the paternal acres, whilst the other brothers make their way to tea estates in Upper Assam for the manufacturing season, often doing double tasks day after day, and returning to the family fold in the autumn with a large and liberal supply of lightly earned rupees at each man’s disposal.