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2 CHAE XL
3 f
4 HUSBANDBY OF CAUBUL.
5 THERE aM' five classes of cultivators in AfghauniBtaun : 1st,
6 Proprietors, who cultivate : thor own land ; 2di Tenants, wfad
7 hire it for a went ia moaey, or lor a fixed proportion of the produce;
8 Sd, Buzgurs, who are the same as the Metayers in France ; 4th,
9 Hired labourers ; ud Stb, Villaina, who cultivate their lord'a lands
10 .without wages.
11 The estates of the proprietors are, of course, various in their ex-
12 tent, ljut on the whole, the land is more equally divided in A^faauni-
13 staun than in most other countries. There n re a great number of
14 small proprietors, who cultivate their laiuls t lu uiselves, assisted by
15 their families, and sometimes by hired htbourers and Buzgurs. The
16 reason of the equal liiv isiou of property will be easily perceived, by
17 adverting to the nature of the goverameiitiof tribes. That distnbu-
18 . tion seems to have been Liieneral in former tim^, and to have been
19 disturbed by various causes. Ilxtraviiijancc or misfortune compel
20 many to sell their lands ; tpiarrels, or a desire lor cliange, induce
21 others to part with them, that they may quit the neighbourhood in
22 which they live, and the divimm of .every man's estate among ' all
23 his' SOBS, which it enjoined by the Mahommedan: ]aw, ' socta 'nDdBn
24 eadi lot too unaUto nuuntaiii its proprietor, who ooniequeatly aidiit
25 g^ves it up to one of his bradien, or tdla it Ptawhwicffii are fimnd
26 among those who here been enricbed by the Ktng^s aervice^ by wart
27 and by succesafbl agriculture or commerce. Much has likewise been
28 brouglht under eoltivation by individuab or sodeties* who have taken
29 meaauKs to ptoeure water for tnigaCion, on which so mncfa depeodi
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