in that book we find numerous rules laid down, and cases adjudged, that probably refer to many centuries preceding even that remote period. The two following stanzas of chapter the eighth, ON JUDICATURE, AND THE DUTY OF KINGS, will demonstrate in how important a light the great legislator of India considered the commerce of that empire and how minute and unwearied ought to be the attention paid to it by its sovereign. The translation, sito should be remembered, is, throughout, strictly and scrupulously verbal, so that the reader cannot fail of being in pos session of the genuine meaning of Menu, and it may be added, that never before did any editor contrive to give to a verbal translation not only such perspicuity butsuch unexampled elegance. hmm oda to pull reqor pai SoftWith Vigilant care should the king exert himself in compelling merchants and mecha nics to perform their respective duties, för, when such men swerve from their duty, they throw the world (that is, a great commercial empirey into confusion." Institutes, p. 243. 1 15 Day by day must the king, though en gaged in forensic business, consider the great object of public measures, and inquire into the state of his carriages,elephants, horses, and SVOL. VI.

U

cars,

cars, his constant revenues and necessary ex. penses, his mines of precious metals, ar gems, (a proof that the Indian sovereign had such mines,) and his treasury." Ibid.

q* In truth, the Indian sovereigns: had no small stimulus to attend to their duty in thus inspecting commercial concerns; for their profits are said, in another place, to have been a twentieth part of the profit of every thing sold. The toll gates, for the passage internally of caravans of merchandize, seem to have been numerous in those early times and the duty collected with the utmost strictness; for, by the 400th article of that chapter of the code, it is enacted, that in to yout

“Any buyer or seller, who fraudulently passes by the toll-office at night, or any other improper time, or who makes a false enumeration of the articles bought, shall be fined eight times as much as heir value.” P. 240.

"Let the king establish rules for the sale and purchase of all marketable things, having duly considered whence they come, IF IMPORTED; and, IF EXPORTED, Whither they must be sent; how long they have been kept; what may be gained by them; and what has been expended on them. Ibid.ge

¡V" Once

Once in five nights, or, at least, every fortnight, according to the nature of the com. modities, (that is, whether they will keep or not,) let the king make a regulation for mar, ket prices in the presence of experienced men:" and this seems to have been the ge, neral practice of Eastern sovereigns, for Pliny tells us, that, at Ocelis, on the coast of Ara bia, the great mart, whither the Indian and Egyptian fleets annually sailed to barter the commodities peculiar to their country for the myrrh and frankincense of Arabia; the king of that country also fixed the price of all the articles sold at that emporium, whether im ported or exported; and he mentions, in proof of this assertion, that, in consequence of the high duties imposed on cinnamon at that port, that precious commodity rose to such a high price at Rome, that a pound of it sold for one thousand sesterces, or about eight pounds sterling.*

7

"Let all weights and measures be well as: certained by him; and, once in six months, let him re-examine them." P. 241...

These passages afford irrefragable evidence of the very rigid attention anciently paid to

the trading concerns of India, and the tract itself, being of such high antiquity, must prove very interesting to the commercial reader. The toll-prices at the different ferries on the Indian rivers are then stated with equally minute precísion.

"The toll at a ferry is one pana, for an empty cart; half a pana, for a man with a load; a quarter, for a beast used in agriculture, or for a woman; and an eighth for an unloaded man." › Ibid. Misomiso2

"Waggons, filled with goods packed up, shall pay toll in proportion to their value; but for empty vessels and bags, and for poor men ill-apparelled, a very small toll shall be demanded." Ibid. res al it to haora 3s In the following article respecting freightage, there is a most remarkable passage, which greatly arrested the attention of the translator, since it decidedly proves that 1200, if not 1500, years before Christ, the Indians, not less than the Phoenicians, navigated the vast ocean. It is as follows:

"For a long passage, the freight must be proportioned to places and time; but this must be understood of passages up and down rivers: AT SEA THERE CAN BE NO SETTLED FREIGHT." Ibid.

"Whatever

"Whatever shall be broken in a boat, by the fault of the boatmen shall be made good by those men collectively, each paying his portion." Ibid.

"This rule, ordained for such as pass rivers in boats, relates to the culpable neglect of boatmen on the water; in the case of inevitable accident, there can be no damages. recovered." Ibid.

It is not, however, only the freightage necessary to be paid for carriage of goods by sea that is thus particularized, for, in another place we find a law relating to the interest which the merchant was, by mutual agreement, bound to pay for the commodity exported.

"Whatever interest or price of the risk, shall be settled between the parties by men WELL ACQUAINTED WITH SEA-VOYAGES, or journies by land, with times and with places, such interest shall have legal force." P. 210.

If the reader should be anxious to know what were the articles bartered in this traffic, I answer whatsoever a great, flourishing, and established, empire could produce, and many' which it did not produce; as gold, silver, lead, copper, and TIN; articles of commerce which

they