ot only expose them when infants, but when grown up
he might imprison, scourge, send them bound to work in the country, and
also put them to death by any punishment he pleased.

A son could acquire no property but with his father's consent, and what
he thus acquired was called his _peculium_ as of a slave.

Things with respect to property among the Romans were variously divided.
Some were said to be of divine right, and were held sacred, as altars,
temples, or any thing publicly consecrated to the gods, by the authority
of the Pontiffs; or religious, as sepulchres--or inviolable, as the
walls and gates of a city.

Others were said to be of human right, and called profane. These were
either public and common, as the air, running water, the sea and its
shores; or private, which might be the property of individuals.

None but a Roman citizen could make a will, or be witnesses to a
testament, or inherit any thing by it.

The usual method of making a will after the laws of the twelve tables
were enacted, was by brass and balance, as it was called. In the
presence of five witnesses, a weigher and witness, the testator by an
imaginary sale disposed of his family and property to one who was called
_familiae emptor_, who was not the heir as some have thought, but only
admitted for the sake of form, that the testator might seem to have
alienated his effects in his life time. This act was called _familiae
mancipatio_.

Sometimes the testator wrote his will wholly with his own hand, in which
case it was called _hologr{)a}phum_--sometimes it was written by a
friend, or by others. Thus the testament of Augustus was written partly
by himself, and partly by two of his freedmen.

Testaments were always subscribed by the testator, and usually by the
witnesses, and sealed with their seals or rings. They were likewise tied
with a thread drawn thrice through holes and sealed; like all other
civil deeds, they were always written in Latin. A legacy expressed in
Greek was not valid.

They were deposited either privately in the hands of a friend, or in a
temple with the keeper of it. Thus Julius Caesar is said to have
intrusted his testament to the oldest of the vestal virgins.

A father might leave whom he pleased as guardian to his children;--but
if he died, this charge devolved by law on the nearest relation by the
father's side. When there was no guardian by testament, nor a legal one,
the praetor and the majority of the tribunes