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IX, 104.
DUTIES OF HUSBAND AND WIFE.
345.
98. Even a Sudra ought not to take a nuptial fee, when he gives away his daughter ; for he who takes a fee sells his daughter, covering (the transaction by another name).
99. Neither ancients nor moderns who were good men have done such (a deed) that, after promising (a daughter) to one man, they gave her to another;
100. Nor, indeed, have we heard, even in former creations, of such (a thing as) the covert sale of a daughter for a fixed price, called a nuptial fee.
101. 'Let mutual fidelity continue until death,' this may be considered as the summary of the highest law for husband and wife.
102. Let man and woman, united in marriage, constantly exert themselves, that (they may not be) disunited (and) may not violate their mutual fidelity.
103. Thus has been declared to you the law for a husband and his wife, which is intimately connected -- with conjugal happiness, and the manner of raising offspring in times of calamity; learn (now the law concerning) the division of the inheritance.
104. After the death of the father and of the mother, the brothers, being assembled, may divide among themselves in equal shares the paternal (and the maternal) estate; for, they have no power (over it) while the parents live.
contradiction between this and the next verses, see note on VIII, 204.
99. Nand. places this verse after the next.
104. Gaut. XXVIII, 1; Baudh. II, 3, 8; Yâgñ. II, 117. The father's estate is to be divided after the father's death, and the mother's estate after the mother's death (Kull., Nâr., Râgh., Nand.). The mother's estate devolves on the sons only on failure of daughters (Nâr.). The word ürdhvam, after,' indicates by implication that the rule holds good in the case of the (father's)
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