true; and these compurgators were in some cases
multiplied to the number of three hundred [u]. The practice also of
single combat was employed by most nations on the continent as a
remedy against false evidence [w]; and though it was frequently
dropped, from the opposition of the clergy, it was continually revived
from experience of the falsehood attending the testimony of witnesses
[x]. It became at last a species of jurisprudence: the cases were
determined by law, in which the party might challenge his adversary,
or the witnesses, or the judge himself [y]: and though these customs
were absurd, they were rather an improvement on the methods of trial
which had formerly been practised among those barbarous nations, and
which still prevailed among the Anglo-Saxons.
[FN [t] Sometimes the laws fixed easy general rules for weighing the
credibility of witnesses. A man whose life was estimated at 120
shillings, counterbalanced six ceorles, each of whose lives was only
valued at 20 shillings, and his oath was deemed equivalent to that of
all the six. See Wilkins, p. 72. [u] Praef. Nicol. ad Wilkins, p 11.
[w] LL. Burgund. cap. 45. LL. Lomb. lib. 2. tit. 55, cap. 34. [x]
LL. Longob. lib. 2. tit. 55. cap. 23. apud Landenb. p. 661. [y] See
Desfontaines and Beaumanoir.]

When any controversy about a fact became too intricate for those
ignorant judges to unravel, they had recourse to what they called the
judgment of God; that is, to fortune: their methods of consulting this
oracle were various. One of them was the decision of the CROSS: it
was practised in this manner: when a person was accused of any crime,
he first cleared himself by oath, and he was attended by eleven
compurgators. He next took two pieces of wood, one of which was
marked with the sign of the cross, and wrapping both up in wool, he
placed them on the altar, or on some celebrated relic. After solemn
prayers for the success of the experiment, a priest, or, in his stead,
some unexperienced youth, took up one of the pieces of wood, and if he
happened upon that which was marked with the figure of the cross, the
person was pronounced innocent; if otherwise, guilty [z]. This
practice, as it arose from superstition, was abolished by it in
France. The emperor, Lewis the Debonnaire, prohibited that method of
trial, not because it was uncertain, but lest that sacred figure, says
he, of the cross should be prostituted in common disputes and
controversies [a].