in opinion in the Quarter Court;
then they shall be summoned to the Fifth Court; so, too, if men
offer bribes, or take them, for their help in suits. In this
court all the oaths shall be of the strongest kind, and two men
shall follow every oath, who shall support on their words of
honour what the others swear. So it shall be also, if the
pleadings on one side are right in form, and the other wrong,
that the judgment shall be given for those that are right in
form. Every suit in this court shall be pleaded just as is now
done in the Quarter Court, save and except that when four twelves
are named in the Fifth Court, then the plaintiff shall name and
set aside six men out of the court, and the defendant other six;
but if he will not set them aside, then the plaintiff shall name
them and set them aside as he has done with his own six; but if
the plaintiff does not set them aside, then the suit comes to
naught, for three twelves shall utter judgment on all suits. We
shall also have this arrangement in the Court of Laws, that those
only shall have the right to make or change laws who sit on the
middle bench, and to this bench those only shall be chosen who
are wisest and best. There, too, shall the Fifth Court sit; but
if those who sit in the Court of Laws are not agreed as to what
they shall allow or bring in as law, then they shall clear the
court for a division, and the majority shall bind the rest; but
if any man who has a seat in the Court be outside the Court of
Laws and cannot get inside it, or thinks himself overborne in the
suit, then he shall forbid them by a protest, so that they can
hear it in the Court, and then he has made all their grants and
all their decisions void and of none effect, and stopped them by
his protest."

After that, Skapti Thorod's son brought the Fifth Court into the
law, and all that was spoken of before. Then men went to the
Hill of Laws, and men set up new priesthoods: In the
Northlanders' Quarter were these new priesthoods. The priesthood
of the Melmen in Midfirth, and the Laufesingers' priesthood in
the Eyjafirth.

Then Njal begged for a hearing, and spoke thus: "It is known to
many men what passed between my sons and the men of Gritwater
when they slew Thrain Sigfus' son. But for all that we settled
the matter; and now I have taken Hauskuld into my house, and
planned a marriage for him if he can get a priesthood anywhere;
but no man will sell his priesthood, and so I will