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118 CHANDRAGUPTA AJSTD BINDUSARA with its complex organization and European notions of the value of statistical information, did not attempt the collection of vital statistics until very recent times, and has always experienced great difficulty in securing rea- sonable accuracy in the figures. The important domain of trade and commerce was the province of the fourth Board, which regulated sales, and enforced the use of duly stamped weights and meas- ures. Merchants paid a license tax, and the trader who dealt in more than one class of commodity paid double. The fifth Board was responsible for the supervision of manufactures on similar lines. A curious and not easily intelligible regulation prescribed the separation of new from old goods, and imposed a fine for violation of the rule. The collection of a tithe of the value of the goods sold was the business of the sixth and last Board, and evasion of this tax was punishable with death. Similar taxation on sales has always been common in India, but rarely, if ever, has its collection been enforced by a penalty so formidable as that exacted by Chandragupta. Our detailed information relates only to the munici- pal administration of Pataliputra, the capital, but it is reasonable to infer that Taxila, Ujjain, and the other great cities of the empire were governed on the same principles and by similar methods. The " Provincials' Edict " of Asoka is addressed to the officers in charge of the city of Tosali in Kalinga. In addition to the special departmental duties above detailed the Municipal Commissioners in their collective