162 THE AGRARIAN SYSTEM OF MOSLEM INDIA 
reports, and the absence of competition for land is borne 
out abundantly from other sources.! In the actual practice 
of the period, these peasants usually came to terms with the 
managers either once a year or once a season, and written 
agreements were frequently exchanged; except in the case 
of existing Contract-holdings, the peasants were usually 
reluctant to bind themselves for a longer period, and their 
attitude was undoubtedly prudent at a time when the 
natural risks of agriculture were supplemented by the 
dangers arising out of the disturbed condition of the country. 
In effect, then, the position of these peasants was con- 
tractual, though the terms of the contract were probably 
influenced by traditions dating from earlier times, traditions 
which, under other circumstances, might have crystallised 
out as definite rights and liabilities. 
The available records justify the statement that at this 
period a Brotherhood existed in most villages, but certainly 
notin all. The institution consisted of a number of peasants 
held together by the tie of a common ancestry, each in- 
dividual having separate possession of the land which he 
cultivated, but the whole body acting together, through its 
representatives, in managing the affairs of the village, and 
paying the revenue to whoever might be entitled to receive 
it." The members were ordinarily grouped in divisions and 
subdivisions on a scheme representing, or at any rate be- 
lieved to represent, the operation of the Hindu law of 
inheritance; and land which was not possessed by an in- 
dividual member might be held jointly by the members of 
a subdivision, or of a division, or by the whole Brotherhood. 
It was frequently observed at the time that the areas 
assigned to the various subdivisions or individuals did not 
correspond exactly with the areas they would have received 
under the law of inheritance, so that a subdivision recorded 
as holding, say, one-fourth of the village would not neces- 
sarily hold one-fourth of the area: and two explanations of 
these discrepancies were recorded, both of which were 
probably true in one village or another. The first explana- 
tion was that the distribution took quality as well as quantity 
1 As an example, I may refer to Twining’s description of his journey 
from Delhi to Fatehgarh in 1794-5, Part IT of Travels in India a Hundred 
Years Ago (London. 1893)