236 Of two Edicts bestowing Land. [No. 3. 



4. By many kings, such as Sagara and others, the earth has 

 been possessed. His, ever, whose is the soil, is its produce. 



5. He that wrongfully resumes a single gold coin, a cow, or 

 even one finger's breadth of glebe, incurs perdition till the con- 

 summation of all things.* 



6. He that unjustly confiscates land, whether given by himself, 

 or given by others, transformed to a worm, grovels, with his ances- 

 tors, in ordure. f 



* Another form of this couplet, but without affecting the sense, has been no- 

 ticed in inscriptions : 



A redundancy is observable in the fourth quarter of this stanza. 



f A couplet almost identical with this, as to its first half, but combining, in a 

 manner, for its remainder, the second distich of the stanza in the text, and the first 

 distich of the stanza there succeeding it, occurs in the Garuda-purdna. With a 

 slight variation, it is not uncommon in inscriptions. It here follows, with a part 

 of its context : 



sr^' w §i^^r wi *f*n^ 5jTf*TOfer n 



-^ *>• "■* ^ 



Preta-kalpa, 30th adhydya, s'l. 15-19. 



1 He that usurps land, bestowed by himself, or bestowed by another, is burn, 

 for sixty thousand years a worm in ordure. 



1 What merit does he acquire who grants away even a finger's breadth of land ! 

 And what guilt does he incur who, without just cause, appropriates even a finger's 

 breadth of land! 



' The estate of a Brahman, possessed through avarice, burns the seizer of it to 

 the seventh generation. Like theft, it indeed burns him while the moon and the 

 stars endure. 



