by way of maintenance. (Smrti Candrikā, Chapter IV. §§ 8-17.) Where there is no partition the mother may demand such an assignment, if she can establish that the ancestral fund is being wasted, or if provision is not duly and punctually made for her maintenance.'

R

CHAPTER IX.

ZAMĪNDĀRĪS NOT IMPARTIBLE.

My tenth False Principle is that: 'Ancient Zamindārīs are not divisible, because they are "of the nature of principalities.""

I have discussed this question at large in my View. And Mr. Innes has not attempted to show that my reasons for denouncing the principle are unsound. He has contented himself with throwing the responsibility for it on the shoulders of the Privy Council, and entirely misrepresenting my argument.

Since writing the View I have obtained some information as to the propriety of dividing kingdoms and offices, which should go some way towards proving that neither by law nor by custom have such things been incapable of division in Madras. In a letter of the year 1714, to be found in the Lettres cur. et édif., vol. xiv., Father Bouchet tells us that in the Madura kingdom there was no law but custom, which was preserved in certain maxims known to all; and that the second of these maxims was to the effect that the eldest son of a King, or Prince, or Poligar, or Head of a Village, does not necessarily succeed to the estates or government of his Father. And he goes on to say that he had admired the sight of two nephews of the

famous Sivaji dividing between them the government of Tanjore, upon the death of their uncle, a brother of Sivaji. They lived together in the Tanjore Palace in perfect union, but for convenience' sake governed each half the kingdom.

Similarly, it is shown in the Madura Country (iii. 105-7) that in 1573 the ruler of Madura was succeeded by his two sons, who were permitted by Arya Nayaga to rule the country with co-ordinate authority; and in 1595 the survivor of these two was succeeded by his two sons, who ruled together for some years. And in the same book (iii. 130) we have an account of the settlement of the Ramnad kingdom, in 1646, by dividing it amongst brothers into three parts, one of which was to be ruled by two brothers conjointly. And there are numerous other indications of the existence in Madras of a custom of dividing princely power amongst several members of a family, when circumstances rendered it necessary or advisable to do so.

As regards hereditary offices, it is, of course, notorious that nothing is commoner in Madras than for a body of kinsmen to divide amongst themselves the produce of lands or emoluments attached to an office, and perform its duties conjointly or in

turn.

Therefore, I can see no sufficient reason for assuming, in opposition to the very decided opinion of Jagannatha, that ancient estates in the nature of principalities' are naturally incapable of division. That they are such by the Sanskrit law, or by general

custom, there is, I believe, not a scintilla of evidence to show. And, if it is once conceded that, both by law and by general custom, an ancient Zamindārī is divisible like any other estate, the onus of proving that by a special custom a particular Zamindari is a thing impartible should lie very heavy, I conceive, on the party who affirms the same. For, there must exist in abundance in the Madras Province Families of the ordinary agricultural form in which partition has never yet taken place. And if, as certainly would be the case, the Madras High Court would at once, and without hesitation, break up one of these Families on the demand of any one of its members, it is difficult to imagine what amount of evidence it ought not to consider insufficient to establish the fact that a special custom prevents a particular Zamindari from being divided.

No doubt in most Zamindāris, as in other considerable estates, there has been from time immemorial a more or less uniform practice of a single capable member taking and managing the estate, upon the death of the last holder, and supporting all the other members of the Family 'like a Father.' But, where, in any given case, it is shown that such practice has been followed for convenience' sake, there would seem to be no necessarily valid objection to the existing members of a Family agreeing together to discontinue the practice, as being in their judgment no longer convenient.

However this may be, I have been gratified by some recent decisions, which make greatly for freedom

and reform. I understand from them that the erroneous principle of taking it as a presumption of law that every ancient Zamindari is by its nature incapable of partition has been definitively abandoned, both in Madras and in England, and that the new doctrine is to the effect that an estate of the kind may, by custom, be either partible or impartible; and, even where during a long space of time it may have been considered to be impartible, may by the practice of those concerned in it become partible, like an ordinary estate. In short, the impartibility of an ancient Zamindari depends now upon the continuous usage of the Family charged with its upkeep; in the absence of such a usage Zamindari, however ancient, is partible.

Thus, in the Shivagunga case, reported at I. L. R., iii. Madras, 290, the Privy Council approached the question of the partibility of the Zamindari as one quite open to doubt, and to be decided, like any other question of fact, upon the evidence; and, finding that 'against all this family belief is only to be set an extremely ambiguous and evasive answer' of a former Zamindar,' upon which nothing can be built,' and that 'the actual enjoyment of the property has been in accordance with the stream of family tradition,' affirmed the decisions of the courts below, to the

Judging from my experience of Tamils, I should suppose that the Zamindar did not at all understand the meaning and aim of the questions. His answer, as it stands, presents no ambiguity to my mind. He seems to have stated quite simply his intention to divide the estate for the benefit of all his children, being conscious of no possible impropriety in his so doing.