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Most other offences are punished by fines, though sometimes other punishments are substituted.

No fine must exceed 1000 panas, or fall short of 250.1

Defamation is confined to this sort of penalty, except with Súdras, who are liable to be whipped. It is to be observed, however, that this class is protected by a fine from defamation, even by a Bramin.

m

Abusive language is still more distinguished for the inequality of punishments among the casts ; but even in this branch of the law are traces of a civilised spirit. Men reproaching their neighbours with lameness, blindness, or any other natural infirmity, are liable to a small fine, even if they speak the truth."

Assaults, if among equals, are punished by a fine of 100 panas for blood drawn, a larger sum for a wound, and banishment for breaking a bone. The prodigious inequalities into which the penalty runs between men of different classes has already been noticed. P

Proper provisions are made for injuries inflicted in self-defence; in consequence of being forcibly obstructed in the execution of one's duty, or in defence of persons unjustly attacked."

Furious and careless driving involves fines as

different in degree as the loss occasioned by the death of a man and of the lowest animal.'

Persons defiling the highways are subject to a small fine, besides being obliged to remove the nuisance.'

Ministers taking bribes in private affairs are punished by confiscation of their property.'

The offences of physicians or surgeons who injure their patients for want of skill; breaking hedges, palisades, and earthern idols; mixing pure with impure commodities, and other impositions on purchasers, are all lumped up under a penalty of from 250 to 500 panas." Selling bad grain for good, however, incurs severe corporal punishment; and, what far more passes the limits of just distinction, a goldsmith guilty of fraud is ordered to be cut to pieces with razors."

Some offences not noticed by other codes are punished in this one with whimsical disregard to their relative importance; forsaking one's parents, son, or wife, for instance, is punished by a fine of 600 panas; and not inviting one's next neighbour to entertainments on certain occasions, by a fine of one másha of silver."

The rules of police are harsh and arbitrary. Besides maintaining patrols and fixed guards, open and secret, the king is to have many spies, who

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III.

BOOK

I.

are to mix with the thieves, and lead them into situations where they may be entrapped. When fair means fail, the prince is to seize them and put them to death, with their relations: the ancient commentator, Culluca, inserts, "on proof of their guilt, and the participation of their relations ;" which, no doubt, would be a material improvement on the text, but for which there is no authority.a

Gamesters, public dancers, and singers, revilers of scripture, open heretics, men who perform not the duties of their several classes, and sellers of spirituous liquors, are to be instantly banished the town.b

Civil law.

Mode of

2. Civil Law.

The laws for civil judicature are very superior to the penal code, and, indeed, are much more rational and matured than could well be expected of so early an age.

Cases are first stated in which the plaintiff is to proceeding. be nonsuited, or the decision to go by default" against the defendant; and rules then given in case the matter comes to a trial.

The witnesses must be examined standing in the middle of the court-room, and in the presence of the parties. The judge must previously address a particular form of exhortation to them, and warn them, in the strongest terms, of the enormous guilt of false evidence, and the punishment with which

a

Chap. IX. 252-269.

с

Chap. VIII. 52–57.

b Chap. IX. 225.

it will be followed in a future state." If there are no witnesses, the judge must admit the oaths of the parties.

e

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evidence.

The law of evidence in many particulars re- Law of sembles that of England: persons having a pecuniary interest in the cause, infamous persons, menial servants, familiar friends, with others disqualified on slighter grounds, are in the first instance excluded from giving testimony; but, in default of other evidence, almost every description of persons may be examined, the judge making due allowances for the disqualifying causes."

Two exceptions which disgrace these otherwise well-intentioned rules have attracted more attention in Europe than the rules themselves. One is the declaration that a giver of false evidence, for the purpose of saving the life of a man of whatever class, who may have exposed himself to capital punishment, shall not lose a seat in heaven; and, though bound to perform an expiation, has, on the whole, performed a meritorious action.h

The other does not relate to judicial evidence, but pronounces that, in courting a woman, in an affair where grass or fruit has been eaten by a cow, and in case of a promise made for the preservation

d Chap. VIII. 79-101. f Chap. VIII. 61–72.

e Chap. VIII. 101.

8 The ancient commentator, Culluca, inserts, after "capital punishment," the words "through inadvertence or error;" which proves that, in his time, the words of the text were repugnant to the moral feeling of the community.

h Chap. VIII. 103, 104.

BOOK of a Bramin, it is no deadly sin to take a light oath.i

I.

Mode of proceedings resumed.

From these passages it has been assumed that the Hindú law gives a direct sanction to perjury; and to this has been ascribed the prevalence of false evidence, which is common to men of all religions in India: yet there is more space devoted in this code to the prohibition of false evidence than to that of any other crime, and the offence is denounced in terms as awful as have ever been applied to it in any European treatise either of religion or of law.*

A party advancing a wilfully false plea or defence is liable to a heavy fine: a judicious rule, which is pushed to absurdity in subjecting to corporal punishment a plaintiff who procrastinates the prosecution of his demand.' Appeals to ordeal are admitted, as might be expected, in so superstitious a people."

i Chap. VIII. 112.

k

"Marking well all the murders comprehended in the crime of perjury, declare thou the whole truth with precision." Chap. VIII. 101.

"Whatever places of torture have been prepared for the slayer of a priest, those places are ordained for a witness who gives false evidence."- Chap. VIII. 89.

"Naked and shorn, tormented with hunger and thirst, and deprived of sight, shall the man who gives false evidence go with a potsherd to beg food at the door of his enemy.""Headlong, in utter darkness, shall the impious wretch tumble into hell, who, being interrogated on a judicial inquiry, answers one question falsely."- Chap. VIII. 93, 94.

1 Chap. VIII. 58, 59.

m Chap. VIII. 114-116.