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274
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(SEPTEMBER, 1907.
34. The members, as mentionod above, are called kardars, wazirs or montas.
35. If the hereditary chairman be a minor, he is represented by a grown-up man belonging to his brotherhood. If a fit person is not to be found in the brotherhood, then the council appoints a guardian.
XIII. - Trade, 33. The chief articles of commerce are opium, potatoes, wool, borax, fur, woollon cloth, stone, goats, and horses. A detailed account is given below.
Kot Kbii is the greatest centre of the opium trade. People buy this article from the surrounding territories, and sell it, according to the laws, at Köt Khai. All the license-holding Kannits go to the neighbourhool to buy opium. Any action against the law is discussed and decided among themselves. The buyers of opium are of two sorts: (1) The license-holders who, like grent merchants, buy opium from their agents. These merchants send to their agents, in the month of Kartik or Maghar, as much money as the agents ask for. The agents in return supply their masters, in the month of Har, with opium at four ropees per seer, no matter what the market rate of opium may be : (2) License-holders who buy opium directly. They buy it at the rate agreed upon by the parties. The same is the case with potatoes. The rest of the trade is with Tibet, and this trade cannot be carried on by a single person. There are three passes into Tibet : the first through Basahir, the second through Garhwal, and a third throngh Sultânpûr in Kúlu. People go for trade in caravans of hundreds of armed men, for the passage is infested with robbers, and for this reason a small number of men cannot safely travel. The traders going by these three paths have, each, a distinct part of the country set apart for trade. One cannot trade in the territory belonging to the other. Any one doing so is arrested. Some men of each of these three territories are appointed as the members of the council in Tibet. Some four or five Tibetans, too, take part in it. All the cases of theft and civil and criminal suits are decided by it. Half the punishment is borne by the Tibetans and balf by the members of the council belonging to the country of the culprit. Besides this, the parties to a caso are required to feed the council. This food is named charrd. The members have fall authority, and they can decide eren murder cases. The money realized from faes is appropriated by themselves. A nominal sum of one or two rupees is paid to the Raja. All commercial contracts are made by the merchants among themselves, and there is no particular rule abont this. Different measures suited to different opportunities are adopted.
The merchants of Busabir are divided into four groups: Takpais, Gavós, Shawls and Rajgrânvis. They are named after the names of their pargando (districts). If a person belonging to one group joins or trades with another group, then the members of his group punish him as well as the group who admitted him without the consent of his party.
The rates of all commodities are fixed by an assembly of all the merchants, and tables of rates are prepared by them. Any one who charges 'a rate higher or lower than the common rate is considered guilty of disloyalty to the assembly. Commodities cannot be sold before a fixed time. The rate of every article is determined by the merchants and the producers of that article after some days' consideration.
XIV. - Artizans, Badts or Carpenters. They build houses and make ploughs and other implements of cultivation. The wages for building houses are pot fixed, but depend upon the labourers and their employers. They make implements of cultivation and give them, every season, to the land owners, free of charge. They get food from the land owners. They also get some grain at the barvest time. This grain is named shikóta.
Ironsmiths. They also, like the carpenters, sorve the land owners.
Shoe-makers and Cobblers - The hides of the dead kine, oxen or buffaloes are given to the cobblers, who make shoes for the land owners of half the hide; the other balf being kept by the shoemaker as his remuneration. They also get some graiu at harvest time.
