The following Paper having been referred by the Council of the Royal Asiatic Society to Sir John Malcolm, for his opinion as to its eligibility for insertion in the Printed Transactions of the Society, was returned by that distinguished and lamented individual, with a Letter of which a copy is subjoined, and which will be found to point out, in a very satisfactory manner, the practical value of Mr. Edye's communication.

The following remarks refer more particularly to the Southern Peninsula of India; but they may perhaps be considered to apply equally, with regard to her ancient institutions of this nature, to India in general; as the Southern Peninsula has undergone, comparatively, but little change from foreign conquest and domination.

The following, from Colonel Frederick, bears such honourable testimony to the character and merits of the much-lamented author of the accompanying Dissertation, that the Council deems it highly deserving of being recorded.

The Penal Law of Nepál, a Hindú state, is necessarily founded on the S'ástras; nor is there any thing material in its marvellous crimes, and more marvellous proofs, for which abundance of justificatory texts may not be produced out of the code of Menu, and others equally well known on the plains.

The accompanying illustrations, with their descriptions, have been taken from an ancient Chinese work, entitled, Pŏ-koo-too, which extends to sixteen large Chinese volumes, and contains several hundred plates of sacred vases, jugs, bottles, &c., &c., of the Shang, Chow, and Han dynasties, comprehending about 1784 years. The compilers of this work were doubtless at considerable trouble and expense; for they state that they examined most of the vases, &c., themselves, and that such as did not come under their notice were copied from works of unquestionable authority.

In presenting to the Royal Asiatic Society a Model of the Tabernacle of the Hindús (in which they take their principal deities out in procession), it may be necessary to observe, that a number of men having placed it on their shoulders, proceed to the appointed spot, accompanied and preceded by priests, singers, players on musical instruments, and the dancing-girls of the temple. In the book of Numbers, eh. i. v. 50, it is written: “Thou shall appoint the Levites over the tabernacle of testimony, and over all the vessels thereof, and over all the things that belong to it: they shall bear the tabernacle, &c.” It is worthy of observation, with regard to the Hindú tabernacle, that it is carried by priests, where there is a sufficient number; and where not, the highest classes among the laymen perform that office.

In the First Volume of the Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, page 240, will be found a brief sketch of the nature, constitution, and objects of the secret fraternity called the “Triad Society,” written by the late Rev. Dr. Milne, and communicated by Dr. Morrison. The. Manifesto, of which a copy is subjoined, appears to have been put forth on swearing in members of that Association. It was found in the English burial-ground at Macao, on the night of Sunday the 19th of October 1828.

On the 1st of June 1823, I visited the “Pinjra Pol,” at Surat; a place which is appropriated for the reception of old, worn-out, lame, or disabled animals. At that time, they chiefly consisted of buffaloes and cows; but there were also goats and sheep, and even cocks and hens; some of which latter had lost their feathers, and here, shorn of their plumes, walked about the courts without molestation.

Circassia is a country as yet unknown to Europeans; and, for this reason alone, it is supposed to be an inhospitable country. This general opinion deprives its inhabitants of intercourse with those nations from whom they might receive the benefits of civilization. Masters of the eastern borders of the Black Sea, between the territories of Russia, their coast is only frequented by the Turks, who are but little capable of refining their manners and diffusing among them the seeds of industry; and it is not therefore surprising that the Circassians, thus left to themselves, should still exist in the state of barbarism which they have inherited from their ancestors.

The large province of Gujarát, or Guzarát, including the peninsula of Katiawár, extends from Banswárah to Dwarka, or, from east to west, about two hundred and ninety miles; and from Bírgaon, in Jalór, to Damán, or, from north to south, about three hundred miles. It is watered by several considerable rivers; among which the Narbada and the Mahi were known to Ptolemy. This, which is one of the most productive districts of India, supplies the greater part of the commercial articles exported from the port of Bombay: these are cotton, opium, saltpetre, indigo, tobacco, grain, and gold-cloths.

This work, as far as our knowledge extends, is the first attempt made by a native of India to produce an elementary treatise on an intricate subject of Hindú Law, modelled after the European plan of a Catechism, written in the form of questions and answers, in the vernacular language of Bengal, with quotations in Sanskrit, from books of established authority, adduced in support of the principles advanced. The greater part of the volume is occupied by a succinct view of the law of Inheritance, according to the system of Jímútaváhana, the author of the Dáyabhága, compared with that of Vijnáneswara, the writer of the Mitákshará. Subjoined, is a short treatise on Adoption, likewise in the form of questions and answers. The following translation of a few passages will give a more precise idea of the plan of the work:—

“7th Question.—If the father is very old, so as to be unable to attend to business—have the sons a right to divide the property or not ?

In presenting to the Royal Asiatic Society the late Captain McMurdo's account of Sindh, embracing the government, productions, and commerce of that country, with the customs and manners of its people, I am entrusted with the pleasing duty of briefly sketching the biography of its estimable author, and of stating in what manner I obtained authority for publishing the statistical information here communicated.

I am a native of the Siculian nation (a tribe of those Hungarians who settled in ancient Dacia in the 4th century of the Christian era), in the great principality of Transylvania, subject to his Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Austria.

I am possessed of particulars relating to the untimely end of a very zealous traveller in Persia, a native of Hesse; who was murdered in Kurdistán, during the autumn of 1829. He has not lived to reap the fruit of his exertions, neither have his notes and observations yet met the public eye.

The work of which the title is copied above at full length, is a specimen of the class which this department of the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society was designed to make more extensively known. It has of late years become not unusual for natives of India to publish literary works in the English language; and the practice would, it is thought, become much more common, were greater extension given to the—at present—very limited sphere in which they are known. In the hope of promoting an object so desirable, in every point of view, as the cultivation of the English language among the natives of the immense possessions in the East subjected to British sway, and to encourage the publication in that language, by themselves, of their literary labours in every department, it has been determined to devote a space in this Journal, in which analyses of such works shall be inserted, and their existence and nature thus become speedily and widely understood.