consequence of which the custom of burying the dead and other unchristian practices were suffered still to subsist. At Lassa, however, the chief seat of the religion, the dead are not burnt but buried. They acknowledge also, that their religious books were originally in some foreign language, from which they were translated into the ancient dialect of Tibet: such of the originals as yet remain are no longer understood by any one. I was not able to procure a single page of these books. The people here have a printed as well as a written character. Their months have no separate appellations, but are distinguished as first, second, third, &c. The years are reckoned after the Turkish manner, comprehending a cycle of twelve years, each being named after an animal, as the Suchkan Il, Daud Il, or year of the cat, cow, &c. The language of Tibet has much in common with those of Turkestan and Cashmir: it abounds with nasals, like the latter; whilst in articulation and accent it resembles Turkish—the hard kaf and ghain, and shin and che often occur. "The dogs of Tibet are twice as large as those of Hindustan; they have large heads, long coats, are very strong and fierce, and are said to be a match for a lion. The cow of this country has a bushy tail, which forms the chowri used in Hindustan; it is of low stature, but is strong and sure-footed, and is much used as a beast of burthen in mountainous and difficult roads. I saw very few of the celebrated Tibet ponies: the breed is originally from Zaishkar, a part of Tibet, ten or fifteen stages from Lei: the price varies from twenty to seventy rupees. They are very fleet and sure of foot, and cross the loftiest passes with ease; they feed them with hay, or, if they wish to make them fat, they give them the grass called rushkeh; fresh if it be spring weather, but dry at other seasons." WHAT IS WOMAN LIKE? AN eastern prince his vizirs once assembled, One said, the sun, the source of light, Woman, cried one, we can compare Stood as a link 'twixt man and heaven. She's like the rainbow, said a third, But who such prize possessed?-Sure, no man: The prince, who found his council thus divided, H. N. THE PUNCHAYET, OR HINDU FORM OF ARBITRATION. To the Editor of the Asiatic Journal. SIR: I have read with no little astonishment an article in a contemporary work (which professes to afford information to the British public on Indian affairs), entitled, "System of Punchayet, or Indian Trial by Jury:" the ignorance, or wilful misrepresentation displayed in that article surpasses every example I have met with, even in the work where it appears. The writer begins with the following tirade :— If the authority of great names, the sanction of ancient custom, or the lessons of every-day experience, could prevail with the legislature of British India, we should not now have needed to take up our pen in favour of the Indian custom of trial by jury, the most valuable institution which India ever possessed; a precious relic of popular rights, which survived all the revolutions of the empire till it fell into our hands. Then only, that which the Tartar conquerors and Mohamınedan despots had spared, was at last, to our shame, totally destroyed by those Christian and civilized conquerors of the West, who had experienced the unspeakable benefits of a similar institution in their own country; for it can never be too often repeated, that the liberty of the press and trial by jury are the two pillars of the British constitution; and were either of these broken down, nothing else of this venerable fabric would remain worth preserving. India, likewise, much as we are accustomed to contemn her ancient institutions, enjoyed to a certain degree both these blessings. How she has been deprived of the first by her " enlightened" rulers, who "love darkness rather than the light," is but too notorious; their triumph over truth can never be sufficiently lamented by the friends of civilization and good government. But if trial by jury, or punchayet, had been left to the natives of India, their condition, under the suppression of free discussion, would have been less deplorable. This, with a great deal more common-place jargon, suited to the understandings of a radical assembly, is succeeded by an attempt to fasten upon the Government of India the crime of destroying this palladium of Indian liberty, by the following ingenious argument : This brings us to the manner in which the punchayet has been destroyed by the British Government, which is itself a conclusive proof of what it was under the native princes.(?) Under them it had flourished for ages, and was cherished by the people with a degree of affection which they have never displayed for any other civil institution. We have made it optional with parties to submit to it or not; and in a few years it has fallen into utter ruin and decay. Nor is this attributable to any change of opinion, for the inhabitants still cling to its memory with fond regret. So that, according to this writer, by allowing the people of India the free use of this mode of trial, whenever the parties agree to adopt it, the British Government has destroyed it; and the people evince the extraordinary degree of affection which they cherish for this institution by suffering it, "in a few years," to fall into " utter ruin and decay!" Moreover, the Indian people "cling to its memory with fond regret," although the writer admits that recourse may be had to it whenever they please! Risum teneatis, amici? This passage would suffice to shew the writer's inconsequential mode of reasoning; but the manner in which facts are disguised and distorted by him is more deserving of exposure, because the reader is less able to detect mirepresentation of facts than false reasoning. The article referred to is headed, in a conspicuous manner, by the following motto : C ! It seems strange that the judicial code, which has been framed expressly for the benefit of the natives, should omit entirely the only mode of trial which is general and popular among them; for there can be no doubt that trial by punchayet is as much the common law of India in civil matters as that by jury in England. No native thinks that justice is done where it is not adopted. SIR THOMAS MUNRO, Governor of Madras. This sentiment of Sir Thos. Munro is inserted again in the body of the article, and the writer of it observes that no higher authority can be quoted. Most certainly Sir Thos. Munro did, in the year 1807, so express himself; and it is equally true, that moved by the representations of that officer, and the opinions of Col. Wilks, Col. (now Sir John) Malcolm, and others, the Court of Directors did direct, in 1814, that punchayets should be introduced into the judicial system of Madras; and it is equally true that, in spite of the remonstrances of many of the practical servants of the Company at that presidency, punchayets were so introduced in the year 1816. It is moreover the fact that it was at first intended (and was so expressed in the original draft of the regulation) to grant a compulsory power to the village munsiff, to summon a punchayet on the application of one party only; which provision was withdrawn at the instance of the two judicial commissioners, of whom Sir Thos. Munro was the chief. Finally, it is the express and recorded opinion of Sir Thos. Munro, delivered in the year 1813, that the people should have the option of resorting either to their own forms or to ours. The following is the reason alleged by that officer in his answer to the queries propounded by the Court of Directors on the subject of the judicial system :— courts. The people should have the option of resorting to the summary decisions of their potails, aumildars, and punchayets, or to the more deliberate judgments of our zillah If our courts are thought to be preferable to their own, they will soon learn to assimilate their own to them in form and practice, and the reformation which we desire will be gradually brought about by their own wishes. If, having a free choice, they still adhere to their own institutions, the plain inference is, that they are better adapted to the present state of society among them; for no forms of law, however excellent in other circumstances, are good, when they are not acceptable to the people for whose use they are intended. All these facts are to be found in the very volume from which the twice quoted sentiments of Sir Thos. Munro, as well as most of the other evidence adduced in the article referred to, are extracted.* They must therefore have been known to the writer, and must consequently have been wilfully suppressed for the sake of deceiving the reader. The writer has availed himself, in the same disingenuous manner, of the authority of Sir John Malcolm, who, he says, has proposed a plan for introducing punchayets into Central India. But he does not state, as he ought to have done, that Sir John abstains expressly from recommending their.compulsory adoption: he proposes merely that the people should be encouraged to resort to these courts of arbitration in petty disputes. And they are so encouraged by our courts. Nearly as much misrepresentation has been displayed in respect to the nature of this Hindu court, which is called by the writer an Indian jury; with the view of interesting the prejudices of Englishmen, and directing them against a Government alleged (on very equivocal grounds) to have destroyed an institution considered in this country to be one of the strongest bulwarks of our liberties. But a Hindu punchayet is as little analogous to the English jury, as was the Court of Areopagites at Athens. The latter institution, parvis componere magna, resembled, indeed, in some of its features, the Hindu * Selection of Judicial Papers from the Records at the East-India House. 1820. Hindu punchayet. Col. Wilks is the only authority of any weight who stre. nuously contends for a resemblance between the punchayet and the jury; and his prejudice may be easily accounted for when it is recollected that in his "Historical Sketches of the South of India," he spoke of the punchayet as a relic, newly discovered by him, of the ancient Hindu judicial system (whereas ît had been long in use in Bengal, prior to the judicial reforms of Lord Cornwallis), and was therefore prone to overrate its value, and to carry the parallel between it and our jury system too far. The description given by Sir Thos. Munro of an ancient punchayet contains no traces of resemblance between them. "The first step of the punchayet," says that officer, "was to take a bond from the parties, stating that they were willing to abide by their decision, copies of which, signed by all the members and the litigants themselves, were given to each of the parties. If the suit was for a thing of little value the decision was given in writing, but the depositions of the witnesses, and very frequently those also of the parties, were omitted. Appeals might be made to the district aumildar, and from him to the aumildar of the province, for a new punchayet, which was, however, rarely granted unless when it appeared that corruption or intimidation had been employed. The punchayet was sometimes placed under restraint with regard to communication with other persons, and obliged to decide without separating; but this was not so usual as adjournments, particularly in matters of accounts." The writer of the article I refer to has studiously concealed the important fact that punchayets were only employed by the Hindus in civil cases. Indeed he gives the unsuspecting reader reason to infer from his exordium, which I have quoted, that it was applicable to both civil and criminal cases, without which it is impossible to compare it to " the pillar of the British constitution." He has likewise stated (apparently from Sir John Malcolm) that " if a murder or robbery was committed, the manager of the town or district either heard the case himself, or sent the parties suspected before a punchayet, composed of not less than five of the public functionaries or inhabitants." This might be a local practice; but hear the statement of Sir Thos. Munro, "the highest authority on this subject,- —a statement which the writer must have seen :"The Hindus did not employ punchayets in criminal cases. The judge, either alone, or with the assistance of his deputies or other public officers, tried and past sentence."* It is obvious that, by whatever name the punchayet may be now perversely called, it is, in fact, but a species of arbitration, and as such it is designated by every well informed writer on the subject. Mr. Colebrooke says that the punchayet is "not of the nature either of a jury or of a rustic tribunal, but merely a system of arbitration, subordinate to regularly constituted tribunals or courts of justice." The writer of the article referred to says “ this dictum is of little weight, and is entirely opposed to the writers on India, who have united to a knowledge of the theory the experience of practice:" and then he refers to Sir John Malcolm's account of this institution in his interesting "Memoir of Central India," as if that excellent writer supported his assertion. But Sir John Malcolm directly contradicts it, for he expressly speaks of the punchayet as a form of arbitration (as Mr. Colebrooke has done), not merely in his last great work, but in his sketch of the Sikhs printed many years back in the Asiatic Researches. As to the statement that practical persons deny the de finition of Mr. Colebrooke, it happens that those who hold such opinion as that the punchayet resembles the English jury, are chiefly military men, who are not the Answers to Court's Queries, p. 113. the best authorities in respect to civil and judicial forms of administration; and that practical persons are almost universally of the same opinion as Mr. Colebrooke; who, by the way, is perhaps himself an unexceptionable instance of theoretical united to great practical skill and observation. Let me refer to the sentiments of a few practical persons, which are contained in the same volume I have before referred to, and which also the writer must have seen. Mr. Ernst * states that "the term punchayet, or punja, is familiar to the natives in most parts of the country as a mode of settling disputes by arbitration; and in its common acceptation it is applied to one or more persons, who are chosen by the parties for that purpose." cr Sir H. Strachey, an authority" (says the writer of the article referred to), "the weight of which none will dispute," states † that the punchayet is occasionally resorted to voluntarily by the Hindus, in disputes concerning castes, and perhaps in matters of village accounts and boundary disputes. "I remember," he continues, no instance of parties in a suit preferring a reference to the punchayet. Should the parties agree, no objection, I conceive, would be made to such reference. Our civil courts never discourage any kind of arbitration: they constantly recommend it to the parties, who will hardly ever agree to it." Again :‡ "the punja, or punchayet, is a Hindu mode of arbitration. The courts, as I have already stated, are in the constant habit of recommending arbitration, of any kind, to parties in a cause." Mr. E. Strachey speaks still more to the point: " Punchayet," he observes, "commonly means nothing more than arbitration; but I suppose it is here (in the question put by the court) used in its more extended sense, and we are to understand by punchayet an assembly of men, generally respected by the caste, or other description of persons under whose authority it assembles, acts and dissolves. We constantly hear parties in our courts referring to punchayet, as a test of propriety, in some way or other; but it must be observed, that the term is extremely vague, till we know the precise meaning which is attached to it. The question whether a Hindu is to be excluded from his caste is constantly determined by the punchayet; but no court of our's would take cognizance of such matters. A Hindu might recover damages from a person who had injured him by making him lose caste; but I do not think he would be able to maintain his case, if he were to sue the members of a punchayet for deciding that he should be excluded from his caste." Again: "I do not suppose it can be in contemplation to force men to become members of punchayets, as we do jurymen in England. Any attempt at this sort must of course be unsuccessful, as it would be a very odious INNOVATION, and could not be enforced without oppression and all manner of abuses. It would make us extremely unpopular, and, in my opinion, would endanger the Government." Mr. J. D. Erskine ¶ gives the following description of the punchayet, which may be opposed to that of Sir Thos. Munro. "This institution is of two descriptions: one is formed of the most respectable persons of the caste, resident in the neighbourhood, and is assembled for the purpose of taking into consideration the conduct of any individual of the caste in any case relating to religious usage, or for deliberating upon matters of any description affecting the general interests of the caste or profession at large; the other is assembled at the instance of any two members of the caste wishing to submit any matter in dispute between themselves to the decision of a punchayet of their brethren. In the former case I am not certain whether there is any particular form of election observed, but in Judicial Selections, p. 29. + Ibid., p. 53. Ibid., p. 73. § Ibid., p. 74. the |