104 



clear light. He says : "In early times, and in backward 

 countries, even in our own age, all rights to property de- 

 pend on general understandings rather than on precise laws 

 and documents. In so far as these understandings can be 

 reduced to definite terms and expressed in the language 'of 

 modern business, they are generally to the following effect : 

 The ownership of land is vested, not in an individual, but 

 in a firm of which one member or group of members is the 

 sleeping partner, while another member or group of members 

 (it may be a whole family) is the working partner. The 

 sleeping partner is sometimes the ruler of the State, some- 

 times he is an individual who inherits what was once the duty 

 of collecting payments due to this ruler from the cultivators 

 of a certain part of the soil, but what, in the course of silent 

 time, has become a right of ownership, more or less definite, 

 more or less absolute. If, as is generally the case, he retains 

 the duty of making certain payments to the ruler of the 

 State, the partnership may be regarded as containing three 

 members, of whom two are sleeping partners. The sleeping 

 partner, or one of them, is generally called the proprietor, or 

 landholder or landlord, or even landowner. But this is an 

 incorrect way of speaking, if he is restrained by law, or by 

 custom which has the force of law, from turning the culti- 

 vator out of his holding, either by an arbitrary enhancement 

 of the payments exacted from him or by any other means. In 

 that case, the property in the land vests, not in him alone, 

 but in the whole of the firm, of which he is only a sleeping 

 partner; the payment made by the working partner is not 

 rent at all, but is that fixed sum, or that part of the gross 

 {proceeds, as the case may be, which the constitution of the 

 firm binds him to pay ; and in so far as custom or law, which 

 regulates these payments, is fixed and unalterable, the theory 



minute on the Bill relating to Malabar Land tenures ; and G.O., dated 2l8t September 

 1882, No. 1008, Revenue. The last paper is most important as containing the declara- 

 tions of Government on the subject of ryot's rights after full inquiry. The conclusions 

 stated by Government are — (1) that the State cannot, without violating the rule and 

 practice dating from time immemorial, assert in this Presidency an exclusive right to 

 minerals in unoccupied lands, but that it is f nlly entitled to a share in such products as 

 in any other produce of the land ; (2) that subject to the payment of a stated proportion 

 of the produce to meet the necessities of the administration, the proprietary right of 

 the ryot in the soil of his holding is absolute and complete ; (3) that he is able to mort- 

 gage, sell, devise or otherwise alienate the land ; (4) that, on these principles, property 

 has been changing hands from time immemorial, and for the Government to put 

 forward a claim now, which has never been asserted and which does not rest in law, 

 practice or precedent, would undoubtedly raise a feeling of distrust and discontent 

 which would take long to allay ; (5) that it would be straining the State's privileges to 

 attach tlie condition of recognition of any exclusive right to minerals on the terms on 

 which lands may bo newly occupied, although in the interests of the general public, it 

 may in particular instances be justifiable to do so, in view to the development of 

 ascertained mineral resources ; and (6) that as regards the vast bulk of the land occupied 

 or likely to be occupied for cultivation, such reservation would be abso'utely objectlesa 

 and would only huve tbs effect of oreatiug widespread distrust iu the miacls of th» peopl9. 



