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tenth, a sixth, a fourth, as the laws of the land, or 

 the necessities of circumstances, may determine."* 



Virtually then, whatever may be the law what- 

 ever the popular belief, there is no perfect property 

 in the soil, either of the king, or of the cultiva- 

 tor, the right of both to their fair and equitable share 

 of the produce being equally strong, legal, and valid. 

 Or if it be desired to define the position more clearly, 

 it can only resolve itself into this, that the property 

 vests in the Community, the King is the agent, and 

 the Cultivator, the tenant or laborer, as the case may 

 be, which simply brings us back to the point from 

 which we started, that community of property is the 

 rule in societies living in a primitive state of civiliza- 



>n. To speak of heavy burthens on the land in 

 * MANU says : " A MILITARY king-, who takes even a fourth 

 part of the crops of his realm, at a time of urgent necessity, as of 

 roar or invasion, and protects his people to the utmost of his power, 

 co mmits no sin." 



On which the Commentator observes : " FROM the circumstances 

 of the times, if confidence cann ot be placed in the subject, the value 

 of a sixth part, or other proportion of the crop, any how ascertained, 

 may be taken, whether the actual produce be more or less thaa 

 Was estimated : this method is authorized by settled usag-e, and is 

 indicated by the text" 



On this law is based the revenue levied, in our own times, by the 

 Maharattas so well known under the title of Chout *. e. the fourth, 

 thus establishing- satisfactorily, that, up to the latest date, the prin- 

 ciple observed in India, has been diametrically the opposite of that 

 adopted in England, the shares in the produce of the soil of the King 

 and the Cultivator in the one case, fluctuating with the seasons 

 and according 1 to circumstances, and in the other, being* fixed and 

 lutable. 



