Kuccess'on.
102 HISTOEY OF INDIA. [Book IV.
AD. — sons "may live under him as under their father." If they do not choose so to live, a division takes place according to certain rules. Two modes of division
Law of are mentioned as being equally legal. According to the one, a deduction from the whole patrimony is first made — the eldest son receiving a twentieth, together with the best chattel, the youngest son an eightieth, and each interme- diate son a fortieth — and then the residue is distributed in equal shares. If the division is made without any previous deduction, the eldest son receives a double share, the next born a share and a half, and the younger sons a share each. Married daughters appear to be excluded, but the unmarried daughters are provided for by their brothers, each of whom is bound to contribute for this purpose " a fom-th part of his own distinct share," and " shall be degraded " if he refuse. The existence of more wives than one gives rise to curious complica- tions. One of these is stated as follows: — " A younger son being born of a first married wife, after an elder son had been born of a wife last married, it may be a doubt, in that case, how the division shall be made." The decision is that the son of the elder wife is to be preferred, but in a less degree than he would have been if he had been also the eldest born.
A man who has no son may appoint his daughter to raise up a son for him, by saying " the male child who shall be born from her in wedlock shall be mine, for the purpose of performing my obsequies." In this case the son suc- ceeds to all the wealth of his maternal grandfather : should she have no son she takes the succession in her own right, foi-, as it is justly asked, " How, if a man have no son, can any inhei-it his property but a daughter, who is closely united with his own soul?" Here, however, a question arises. Suppose that the father, after a son is thus raised up to him by his daughter, has a son of his own body, which of the two sons shall be his heir? The answer is, that they sliall divide the heritage between them. Failing either of these sons, a man may obtain a son by adoption. Such a son enjoys all the rights of a son in the family into which he has been adopted, but " must never claim the family and estate of his natural father." In the event of there being no son, actual or adopted, and no son raised up by a brother or kinsman, as under the Jewish law, a series of substitutes, called sons only by an extraordinary legal fiction, are provided, "for the sake of preventing a failure of obsequies," such a failure being regarded by a Hindoo as the greatest of all possible calamities. Instead of attending farther to these substitutes, it is of more consequence to trace the order of succession should there be no son of any kind nor daughter to take it. First in order come grandsons, then nephews, then parents, then brothers, then grandfathers and grandmothers, then kinsmen so near as to be entitled to perform obsequies to ancestors. On complete failure of kindred, the spiritual preceptor, the pupil, or the Brahmins succeed. Last of all comes the king, as uUimus hcvres, subject, however, to the important limitation, that the deceased was not a
Brahmin, for "the property of a Brahmin shall never be taken by the king:"
