and in many cases the workings of conscience itself, on being brought to a test, which it was firmly believed was directed by a Supreme omniscient Being, would produce effects consonant to the justice of the cause, and every such event would give strength to the popular faith in the efficacy of the trials. The rocking-stones which are found on the coast of Cornwall, and other parts of England, were used as an ordeal by the Druids; and well might fear palsy the hand ere it touched the rock of trial, while innocence boldly approached and moved the mighty mass *. Notwithstanding these considerations which account for a similarity of principle, the exact coincidence of many of the forms used, persuades me, that they are so many traces of the ancient and intimate connexion which Sir William Jones pronounces, it would be possible to prove, between the first race of Persians and the Indians, to whom we may add the Greeks and Romans, the Goths and the old Egyptians or Ethiops, who according to him originally spoke the same language, and professed the same popular faith: And probably the more familiar we become with the antique customs, laws and manners of Hindostan, the stronger will the resemblances be found, and the clearer the traces of the ancient connexion and subsequent separation of these various tribes.

But I will not detain you with my own opinions on the subject, but state the facts on which they are grounded. The trial by ordeal is of nine kinds, 1st, by the balance, 2d, by fire, 3d, by water, 4th, by poison, 5th; by the cosha, 6th, by rice, 7th, by boiling oil, 8th, by red-hot iron, and 9th, by images.

The first, a trial by the balance, is made by the accused person performing worship to the fire, and afterwards fasting a whole day, when he is weighed twice or thrice, and if at the second or third weighing he is found heavier than at first he is guilty. The writing on the wall over against Belshazzar king of Babylon, "thou art weighed in the balance, and found wanting," (Daniel, chap. v. ver. 27) of which text Milton has made so noble a use in the end of the 4th book of the Paradise Lost.

The fiend looked up and knew
His mounted scale aloft, nor more but fled
Murmuring, and with him fled the shades of night.

Probably refers to a similar trial used by the
Babylonians; and Homer also makes Jove hang
out the scales of life to weigh the fate of his son
Sarpedon.

The second and third ordeals, those by fire and water, were administered pretty much in the same manner as in the western courts. In the former, the culprit after his accusation had been publicly declared, walked through fire or over hot embers. The antiquity of this trial needs no farther proof than the passage of the Ramayuna, where Sita to dispel the suspi+ cions of Rama passed through the fire. Its existence in ancient Persia is proved by Ferdousi, one of whose heroes, Syawousch, the eastern Hippolytus, passes through the fiery ordeal to clear himself from the guilt imputed to him by his mother-in-law. But the most extraordinary use of the fire ordeal that I recollect, belongs to Europe: I mean the famous trial of the Musarabic and Romish liturgies in Spain, during the eleventh century, which was had recourse to after the trial by judicial combat; when, contrary to the wishes of the court, and the interest of the superior clergy, the champion of the Musarabic book, had triumphed over the knight of the Roman faith*. The last legal trials by fire or by water in England were in King John's reign; but I suspect that since that time many an old woman has been drowned in endeavouring to prove her innocence of witchcraft, by the trial whether she sank or swam in water. This mode of trial differs but little from that of the Hindûs, among whom the accused is compelled to put his head under water, and if he raises it before a person appointed for the purpose has walked a certain distance, he is guilty.

The trials by poison are of two kinds. One is by swallowing poison from the hand of a Brahmin after worshipping the fire, when the culprit is absolved if he survives, and the other method is to take a ring out of a vase in which a venemous snake has been confined, who at once convicts and punishes the unfortunate wretch if he bites him.

The trial by the Cosha resembles that mentioned in the fifth Chapter of Numbers, which treats of the law of jealousy. Among the Hindûs it is conducted by making the accused person drink of the water in which idols have been washed, while the Jews put the dust that covered the floor of the tabernacle into the water. In both cases indisposition within a prescribed time after the draught was the sign of guilt.

The trial by rice was performed by chewing consecrated rice, and if it came out of the mouth bloody or dry the accused person was condemned. The trial by images, called Dherma and Adherma, or justice and injustice, consisted in taking out of a covered vase a figure of lead or other base metal, or one of silver. The silver image absolved, and the base metal condemned. Sometimes pieces of black and white cloth with the images painted on them were used.

The trial by red-hot iron has been used in Europe in various forms. In the early history both of France and England, there are instances of accused persons of high rank, particularly women, walking over red-hot ploughshares; and you doubtless remember the anecdote of one of the Paleologi, who, when required by the patriarch of Constantinople to take a red-hot ball off the altar, begged the holy man to set him the example, as certainly his innocence must be sufficient to guard him from harm, if it were possible that a soldier might remain unhurt. In this latter form of handling a hot ball, a man was tried at Benares, in the year 1783, on the following occasion. A man accused one Sancar of larceny, who pleaded not guilty, and as the theft could not be proved by legal evidence, the trial by ordeal was offered to the appellee, and accepted by him; and after obtaining permission from the Honourable Company's government, it was conducted as follows, in the presence of Ali Ibrahim Khan, chief magistrate of Benares, from whose account of it, in the first volume of