The _Moplahs_, or Mohammedans of Malabar, are descended from Arab mariners and traders by native women, and hence their name, from _Mah-pilla_ "son of the mother." They have certainly been established in Malabar for a thousand years, if not more, as it is on record that the Viceroy Cheruman Permal, who then divided the country amongst his chiefs, was converted by a Moplah, and sailed for Mecca. All the sympathies of the Moplahs are with Arabia and the Red Sea, and they frequently undertake pilgrimages to Mecca. Respecting their creed they are fanatical, and are easily roused to fury by an insult, or an attempt on the part of the Nairs to treat them as a lower caste. On these occasions they run mucks; but in ordinary times they are hard-working, intelligent, abstemious, excellent boatmen, and capital backwoodsmen. Many of the Moplahs are very wealthy. Their mosques, however, are poor edifices, not to be distinguished from ordinary dwelling-houses, and the temples of the Hindus are no better. There is no attempt at ornamental architecture in the religious buildings of Malabar. One-fifth of the collectorate of Malabar is taken up with rice and garden cultivation, the remaining four-fifths being covered with forest, or cleared for dry grains and coffee plantations. The land revenue, taking the average of five years ending in 1858-59, is 255,000_l._ The assessment of the rice-lands is essentially the same as that fixed by the Government of Tippoo Sultan of Mysore in 1783-84. Though unequal, and in some places burdensome, it is on the whole light, and, except in two of the Talooks,[392] it is lighter in the north than in the south. As an example of the inequality of the land-tax, I may mention that the district of Pattaumby, on the river Ponany, is very highly and unfairly assessed, as it is said, from the following cause. Before the invasion of Tippoo all the land in Malabar was in the hands of feudal chiefs; there was no land-tax, and the Zamorin and other Rajahs were supported by the produce of their own estates. The first ruler who imposed a land-tax was the Mysore conqueror. Any village which offended his officers was highly assessed; and hence the present inequalities, which will, however, be corrected by the new Survey and Assessment Commission. In the case of Pattaumby the accountant quarrelled with the landowners, and threatened to impose a heavy assessment, and, when they attempted to murder him, he escaped to Wynaad, and sent in his report to Tippoo.