THE Government of British India have not neglected to countenance the study of the indigenous and other systems of law which they found established on acquiring possession of the country. Warren Hastings was the first to recognize the value of such knowledge; and to his encouragement, if not to his incitement, we are indebted for the compilation of Hindoo law translated by Halbed, Jones, Colebrooke, Macnaghten, Hamilton, and a pretty numerous body of accomplished men, of whom Mr. Baillie is the most recently enrolled laborer in the vineyard, have carried on the good work. More comprehensive and accurate views of Hindoo law have gradually been developed, and the more advanced and more influential system of Mahometan jurisprudence has also shared in the attention of European students. There is, however, still much to be done in this field of inquiry; as a few remarks on the nature of the present publication, and the source whence its materials are derived, will show. [Footnote 4: The Moohummadan Law of Sale, according to the Hunefeea Code: from the Futawa Alumgeeree, a Digest of the whole Law, prepared by command of the Emperor Aurungzebe Alumgeer. Selected and translated from the original Arabic, with an Introduction and explanatory Notes, by Neil B.E. Baillie, Author of "The Moohummadan Law of inheritance." Published by Smith and Elder.] The law of Mahometan jurists is for India pretty much what the Roman law is for Scotland and the Continental nations of Europe. Savigny has shown how, throughout all the territories formerly included within the limits of the Roman Empire, a large amount of Roman legal doctrines and forms of procedure continued to be operative after the Empire's subversion. The revival of the study of the Roman law, as embodied in the compilations of Justinian, by the doctors of the school of Bologna, augmented and systematized these remnants of Roman jurisprudence, and extended their application to countries which (like great part of Germany) had never been subjected to the sway of Rome. In like manner, throughout that part of India which was permanently subdued and organized by the Mogul dynasty, and also those parts in which minor Islamitic states were established, the organization of the courts of justice, and the legal opinions of the individuals who officiated in them, necessarily introduced a large amount of Mahometan jurisprudence. This element of the law of India was augmented and systematized by the writings of private jurists, and by compilations undertaken by command of princes. As with the Roman jurisprudence in Europe, so with Mahometan jurisprudence in India, only so much of its doctrines and forms could at any time be considered to possess legal force as had been reenacted by the local sovereigns, or introduced by judges in the form of decisions. A systematic knowledge of the whole body of Mahometan law was important to the Indian lawyer, as enabling