The Martial Races Of India

Who and what are the martial races of India, how do they come and in what crucible, on what anvils hot with pain spring the soldiers of India? Who is the great bearded Sikh with his uncut Nazarite hair, his curling beard, and the enormous head-dress with encircling quoit? What bring the jaunty swaggering hillman from the frontier, who treads the ling like a buck in spring, to the wars of the East and West? Where does the square shouldered athletic Mussulman of the Punjab fit in the system of India, of the lithe Maharatta, with the uncouth Prakrit, whom the Lord Lake?s army in the beginning of the nineteenth century provoked to a fine Maharatta fury, by dubbing them the ?Untoo Goorgas? because of their out-land speech? Does the squat, pug-faced little Mongolian Gurkha with a Kilmarnock cap on the side of his little head fit at all with the tall Rajput longhead, and where comes the Pariah of Madras. Do they the gloriamur swell or the quare fremuerunt? Indeed, to understand what is meant by the martial races of India is to understand the real story of India. Sir Geore MacMunn who served in close touch with most of these races tells in this book the story of Rajput and Turk, of Afghan and Sikh, of Maharata and the Mogul. The whole story is glorious, stimulating and rich.