While there is a massive ethnographical and anthropological literature on Indian tribes, relatively little attention has been paid to tribal patterns of demographic behaviour, especially in a historical perspective. Systematic studies of tribal demographic behaviour can, however, provide important insights into how different patterns of demographic behaviour can be attributed to socio-cultural differences. Evaluating fertility differences between tribal and nontribal groups in the past may prove useful for a better understanding of contemporary differences in fertility and their determinants. This paper analyses tribal fertility in comparative perspective, in the late 19th and early 20th century.