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these lands. I allude to the hucks, or rights of the 

 natives therein, those hucks the scrupulous respect 

 for which Lord Canning declared to be one of 

 the most solemn duties of the Government of India, 

 and which declaration Her Majesty's Government 

 most cordially approved. Now it must be borne 

 in mind that the native idea on the subject of 

 these hucks, is peculiar and very strong, amount- 

 ing even to the assertion of a right of property, 

 or, at least, of joint-ownership. These rights con- 

 stitute occupancy, pre-emption, right of grazing 

 cattle, cutting wood, grass &c., use of water courses, 

 and general right to the products of all waste lands, 

 mines, quarries not worked, &c., rights of way, rights 

 to certain municipal offices, family rights &c. To 

 the general English reader it may appear that little 

 difficulty would beset the path of a Statesman in dis- 

 posing of rights to which no title could be made out ; 

 but to all familiar with the early history of Property, 

 and the constitution of society in the Patriarchal 

 form, it will be apparent, that this subject is one 

 involved in some complication. That the state of 

 society in the greater part of India is of the true 

 archaic type, Mountstuart Elphinstone in his History 

 of India, has already acquainted the public. A 

 right of occupancy here is not, as Blackstone has 

 supposed, a ' kind of transient property in.' It is 

 asserted to be an inalienable right of possession, of 

 which the holder cannot be dispossessed without 



