In India all Pushtu-speaking people come under this designation—a corruption of the word “Pukhtun”—the term being frequently used to denote equally the Pathan proper, the Afghan, the Tajik, the Hazara and the Ghilzai; but, strictly speaking, the title is not really applicable to any of the four last, who, though related to the true Pathan by historical, geographical and ethnological association, are none the less distinct peoples. There is great conflict of opinion as to the original stock from which the Pathans have sprung—the traditions of the people themselves are conflicting, vague and misleading, but the Pathans believe that they are descended from Saul, the first King of the Jews. They speak of themselves as “Beni Israel,” the children of Israel, and the greybeards of the Pathan tribes are fond of tracing their story back to Ibrahim, Isak and Yakub. However far-fetched and mainly traditionary the connection may be, there is, as discussed by Bellew, a savour of Israelitish custom and an often remarkable similarity of name still surviving—Amazites, Moabites and Hittites live again in Amazai, Muhibwal and Hotiwal, to be found on Mount Morah, the hill Pehor, and the plain of Galilee (Jalala); there is the valley of Sudum; the observance of the “Passover,” offering sin and thank offerings, or driving off the scapegoat laden with the sins of the people—with many other religious and social observances which are Jewish rather than Islamic in their origin. It would seem that the Pathan race is closely allied to the Afghan on the one side, and, though perhaps not so closely, to certain tribes of Aryan Indians on the other. (The language is a mixture of partly Persian, partly Indian—Prakrit—origin.) The Pathan may be indeed described as an Indian Afghan, and the probabilities are that he represents an earlier eastern emigration of certain sections of the same tribes as have given birth to the Afghan; and from this point of view the Pathan and the Afghan are by origin one and the same. Whatever view is correct, there can be no doubt that the Pathan differs from the Afghan in the possession of certain Indian affinities not present in the other. Whether these are due to an admixture of Indian blood, or whether they are merely the result of close and prolonged political and social contact with India, is a matter of no very particular importance.