26. WHEN good women, united with husbands in CHAP. ' expectation of progeny, eminently fortunate and wor thy of reverence, irradiate the houses of their lords, ' between them and goddesses of abundance there is no diversity whatever. 27. The production of children, the nurture of them, when produced, and the daily superintendance ' of domestick affairs are peculiar to the wife : 28. From the wife alone proceed offspring, good ' household management, solicitous attention, most exquisite caresses, and that heavenly beatitude which 'she obtains for the manes of ancestors, and for the husband himself. 6 6 6 29. She, who deserts not her lord, but keeps in 'subjection to him her heart, her speech, and her body, shall attain his mansion in heaven, and, by the virtuous in this world, be called Sádhwì, or good • and faithful; 30. But a wife, by disloyalty to her husband, 'shall incur disgrace in this life, and be born in the next from the womb of a shakal, or be tormented ' with horrible diseases, which punish vice. 31. LEARN now that excellent law, universally sa lutary, which was declared, concerning issue, by great ' and good sages formerly born. 32. They consider the male issue of a woman as the son of the lord; but, on the subject of that I lord, a difference of opinion is mentioned in the IX. IX. CHAP. Veda; some giving that name to the real procreator ' of the child, and others applying it to the married possessor of the woman. 33. The woman is considered in law as the field, and the man as the grain: now vegetable bodies are 'formed by the united operation of the seed and the 'field. 34. In some cases the prolifick power of the male is chiefly distinguished; in others, the receptacle of the female; but, when both are equal in dignity, the offspring is most highly esteemed: 35. In general, as between the male and female powers of procreation, the male is held superiour; since the offspring of all procreant beings is distinguished by marks of the male power. 36. Whatever be the quality of seed, scattered in a field prepared in due season, a plant of the same quality springs in that field, with peculiar visible properties. 37. Certainly this earth is called the primeval 'womb of many beings; but the seed exhibits not in ' its vegetation any properties of the womb. 38. On 39. Rice-plants, mature in sixty days, and those, IX. which require transplantation, mudga, tila, másha, CHAP. barley, leaks, and sugar-canes, all spring up ac'cording to the seeds. 40. That one plant should be sown, and another produced, cannot happen: whatever seed may be sown, even that produces its proper stem. 41. Never must it be sown in another man's field by him, who has natural good sense, who has been 'well instructed, who knows the Véda and its Angas, 'who desires long life: 6 42. They who are acquainted with past times, have preserved, on this subject, holy strains chanted by every breeze, declaring, that seed must not be 66 'sown in the field of another man.” 43. As the arrow of that hunter is vain, who 'shoots it into the wound, which another had made just before in the antelope, thus instantly perishes the seed, which a man throws into the soil of • another: 44. Sages, who know former times, consider this earth (Prithivi) as the wife of king PRITHU; and thus they pronounce cultivated land to be the property of him, who cut away the wood, or who clear 'ed and tilled it; and the antelope, of the first hun ter, who mortally wounded it. 6 45. Then only is a man perfect, when he consists of three persons united, his wife, himself, and his and thus have learned Bráhmens announced son; CHAP. this maxim: IX. "The husband is even one person with ' his wife," for all domestick and religious, not for all civil, purposes. 46. Neither by sale nor desertion can a wife be ' released from her husband: thus we fully acknow 6 ledge the law enacted of old by the Lord of crea6 tures. 6 47. Once is the partition of an inheritance made once is a damsel given in marriage; and once does a man say "I give :" these three are, by good men, done once for all and irrevocably. 48. As with cows, mares, female camels, slavegirls, milch buffalos, she-goats, and ewes, it is not 'the owner of the bull or other father, who owns the offspring, even thus is it with the wives of • others. 49. They, who have no property in the field, but, having grain in their possession, sow it in soil owned by another, can receive no advantage whatever from the corn, which may be produced: 50. Should a bull beget a hundred calves on cows 'not owned by his master, those calves belong solely to the proprietors of the cows; and the strength of the bull was wasted: 51. Thus men, who have no marital property in women, but sow in the fields owned by others, may raise up fruit to the husbands; but the pro'creator can have no advantage from it. 52. Unless there be a special agreement between CHAP. the owners of the land and of the seed, the fruit IX. 6 belongs clearly to the land-owner; for the receptacle is more important than the seed: 53. But the owners of the seed and of the soil may be considered in this world as joint owners 6 of the crop, which they agree, by special compact ' in consideration of the seed, to divide between ' them. 6 54. Whatever man owns a field, if seed, conveyed into it by water or wind, should germinate, the plant belongs to the land-owner: the mere sower takes not the fruit. 55. Such is the law concerning the offspring of Cows, and mares, of female camels, goats, and sheep, of slave-girls, hens, and milch buffalos, un'less there be a special agreement. 56. THUS has the comparative importance of the 'soil and the seed been declared to you: I will 'next propound the law concerning women, who have no issue by their husbands. 57. The wife of an elder brother is considered as 'mother-in-law to the younger; and the wife of the younger as daughter-in-law to the elder: 6 58. The elder brother, amorously approaching the wife of the younger, and the younger, caressing the wife of the elder, are both degraded, even though |