It is remarkable that the above custom prevails in the British House of Lords; it being determined in the Earl of Danby's case, that the lords spiritual have a right to stay and sit in court in capital cases, until the court proceeds to the vote of guilty or not guilty.

After trial and conviction (the extraordinary privilegium clericale being here unknown) the senior deemster pronounces the awful sentence of death, which consists of being hanged by the neck till dead; no other punishment for capital offences being here used, except that for treason; but the execution must be delayed till the pleasure of his Majesty is known.

With regard to the crime of treason, as it stood previous to the revesting act, it is thus defined by the ancient laws, viz. "Rising against the king's or lord's lieutenant or governor ; breaking the church or the house of the lieutenant, or any of the king's council; robbing or beating the lieutenant, or coming in arms against him, &c. And the sentence was, forfeiture of lands and goods; drawing with horses; then hanged and quartered, and their heads stricken off, and set upon the Castle Town over the burn; another quarter at Halland* Town, the third quarter to be set at Ramsay, and the fourth at Douglas."

Respecting the ancient punishment, when the offence was not deemed capital, by an ordinance of Sir John Stanley, King of Man, made at his Castle of Rushen in 1422: "If the prisoner be the king's born man, and hath made faith and fealty, and put him in grace, if he be

* Now called Peel.

indicted and no manour in his hand, or the verdict be given that he ought, by the law of Man, to have his life; he must forfeit his goods, and then shall he have his choice of three things by the deemsters judgment; first, he shall choose whether he will rest in prison a year and a day with substance of the prison; viz. he shall have bread, one part meal and the third part ashes, and to drink of the water next the prison door; the second is to forswear the king and all his land; or else, for the third, to pay the king three pounds."

The consequences of being capitally convicted, so far as relates to forfeiture, are the following, by an ordinance of the council and Keys in 1504: "All felons goods, as horses, mares, oxen, and kine above two years old, belong to the lord, and those that are two years and under to the coroner."

By a record in the Liber Scaccarii*, it appears that in case a person under the age of fourteen years shall be arraigned for felony, the deemsters shall not proceed to trial, but shall cause the prisoner to be whipped at the governor's pleasure.

It is remarkable, and certainly redounds greatly to the honour of Manksmen, that since the revesting act of the island in the British crown in 1765, his Majesty has had few opportunities of exercising one of the most amiable of his prerogatives, there having been only two insular capital convictions, in the long period of half a century.

A. D. 16011

OF THE COURT OF COMMON LAW, AND TRIAL BY JURY.

THE trial by jury or per pais having been used in all countries which adopted the feudal system, so in this island, from remote antiquity, a jury of four" boni homines" from every parish, like the Gothic nembda, which was collected out of every quarter of the country,

binos, trinos, vel etiam senos, ex singulis territorii quadrantibus *" were summoned to serve on the "great inquest," and part of their duty, after a charge from the deemsters in the Celtic or Manks language (which is continued to this day), consisted in presenting to the deemsters in open court, every offence against the community that bad been committed since the last court. It was especially their duty to present those who had abjured the land, and had returned again without the lord's special pardon and license, and also to present the coroners and petty officers who neglected their duty, and all mechanics who did not execute their occupations according to the old laws.

With regard to the establishment of the trial by jury in this place, of what remote date or time soever it might be, it is more than probable that no conquest or change of government did ever abolish it; indeed, so universal was the practice of investigating all differences and wrongs by a jury, that the act of Tynwald + which

* Stiernhook, de jure Goth. 1. 1. c. 4.

+ Appendix, common law court.

E

1

points out the mode of prosecuting causes at common law, has a particular reference to the ancient proceeding of trespass juries, and juries of inquiry, which this act directs shall not be altered. These juries consist of four men, occasionally summoned by one of the deemsters out of the parish where any trespass has been committed, or any loss sustained; and it is their province, in the one case, to view and estimate the damages done, and, in the other, to endeavour to discover what was lost, and the person who had taken away or concealed the same; for which purpose all the neighbourhood may be summoned before the jury, and every individual is either to acquit himself by his oath, or to be held convicted by his refusal.

The above statute also alludes to the great inquest, and also to another species of trial per pais, called the long jury, but directs that all proceedings thereby shall cease, and that all matters which were formerly cognizable before them shall be tried at the common law court.

The ancient proceedings of this court prescribe, that the coroner of Glanfaba, who takes precedence of all the others, shall open the court with the following proclamation in the Manks language: "Tha mee chur y quaaill fo harey ayns ennym y rhee nagh jen pegeagh erbee thrushey baggart ny burranys, agh dhy jen dhy chooiley chooiney phreggert myr vys e er ny eam. Tha mee chur recoartys er yn Eanish dhy vel y quaaill fo harey."—" I do fence this court, that no manner of person do quarrel, or brawl, or

molest the audience, and that they do answer when called by license of the king and this court. I draw witness to the whole audience that the court is fenced."

The statute of 1738 regarding the limitation of actions, specifies that all actions, of what nature soever, which shall be commenced at any of the temporal courts, must be prosecuted within three years next after the cause of such action, except actions of assault, battery, wounding, imprisonment, or for slander, which must be commenced within two years; and also in the case of persons under age, under coverture, non compos mentis, imprisoned, or beyond the seas, who are to prosecute after their respective impediments are removed within the times before limited,

At the next term, or common law court, after the declaration is filed, the defendant is bound to plead and join issue, or otherwise the plaintiff may join issue for him; for the nicety and exactness of special pleading, which is 'so essential in England, is here in a great measure disregarded, the forms of the court requiring the declaration to be merely a plain simple statement of the plaintiff's case, and either party may offer such testimony as the court shall deem relevant to the matter in question. And in all cases where a special plea is not offered, the general issue is always implied, and the special matter is given in evidence. With respect to the witnesses, they are compelled to attend, when summoned by the coroner or lockman on the deemster's warrant, on pain of being subject to a fine, and to such costs