Government, but the rest must
gradually deteriorate till the dignities of their class have become
a mere memory. The humbler members of the caste find their employment
as petty contractors or traders, private servants, Government peons,
_sowars_ and hangers-on in the retinue of the more important families.

"What [218] little display his means afford a Maratha still tries to
maintain. Though he may be clad in rags at home, he has a spare dress
which he himself washes and keeps with great care and puts on when he
goes to pay a visit. He will hire a boy to attend him with a lantern
at night, or to take care of his shoes when he goes to a friend's
house and hold them before him when he comes out. Well-to-do Marathas
have usually in their service a Brahman clerk known as _divanji_ or
minister, who often takes advantage of his master's want of education
to defraud him. A Maratha seldom rises early or goes out in the
morning. He will get up at seven or eight o'clock, a late hour for
a Hindu, and attend to business if he has any or simply idle about
chewing or smoking tobacco and talking till ten o'clock. He will
then bathe and dress in a freshly-washed cloth and bow before the
family gods which the priest has already worshipped. He will dine,
chew betel and smoke tobacco and enjoy a short midday rest. Rising at
three, he will play cards, dice or chess, and in the evening will go
out walking or riding or pay a visit to a friend. He will come back
at eight or nine and go to bed at ten or eleven. But Marathas who
have estates to manage lead regular, fairly busy lives."

9. Nature of the Maratha insurrection

Sir D. Ibbetson drew attention to the fact that the rising of the
Marathas against the Muhammadans was almost the only instance in
Indian history of what might correctly be called a really national
movement. In other cases, as that of the Sikhs, though the essential
motive was perhaps of the same nature, it was obscured by the fact
that its ostensible tendency was religious. The _gurus_ of the Sikhs
did not call on their followers to fight for their country but for a
new religion. This was only in accordance with the Hindu intellect,
to which the idea of nationality has hitherto been foreign, while its
protests against both alien and domestic tyrannies tend to take the
shape of a religious revolt. A similar tendency is observable even in
the case of the Marathas, for the rising was from its inception largely
engine