4. _Hindu Law._--The Hindu law is in theory of divine origin, and therefore unchangeable by human authority. Ask a Hindu where his law is to be found, and he will reply "In the Shasters." The Shasters are certain books supposed to be divinely inspired, and all of great antiquity. They contemplate a state of society very unlike that of the present day, or that of many centuries back. It follows that these sacred writings, whilst they leave many of the legal requirements of the present day wholly unprovided for, contain many provisions which no Hindu even would now think of enforcing. Consequently, in spite of the theory, the law had to be changed. Legislation, which with us is the most potent as well as the most direct instrument of change, has had scarcely any effect on the Hindu law. Probably it never entered into the head of any Hindu before British rule was set up in India that any human agency could be entrusted with the power of making or changing the law; and although both the Indian legislatures and the British parliament have full power to legislate for Hindus upon all matters without any exception, they have, in fact, hardly ever exercised this power as regards the Hindu law. Custom is a less direct instrument of change than legislation, and operates more slowly and secretly, but its influence is very great. The custom which supplants the sacred law may indeed be as old or older than the sacred law, and its existence may be due to the divinely inspired law having failed to displace it; or the habits and necessities of the people may have engrafted the custom upon the sacred law itself. In either view there has been no difficulty in accepting custom where it varied from the sacred law. Indeed, the sacred books themselves recognize to some extent the operation of custom. Thus we find it said in the Laws of Manu (viii. 4, 1), "the king who knows the sacred law must inquire into the laws of castes, of districts, of gilds and of families, and thus settle the peculiar law of each." It is to the influence of custom that the divergence between the Hindu law of to-day and that of the Shasters is largely due. Another method by which law is developed, and one more subtle still, is interpretation; and it is one which in skilful hands may be used with considerable effect. Without any dishonesty, people very often find in the language of the law words sufficiently vague and comprehensive to cover the sense which they are looking for. The action of interpretation upon Hindu law differs accordingly as it took place before or after the British occupation. Formerly the only persons whose interpretation was accepted as authoritative were the writers of commentaries. But the Indian courts are very sparing in accepting modern commentaries as authoritative, though nevertheless they carefully record their own interpretations of the law, and these are always treated as authoritative. It follows, from