g and the dead.
Amen."

THE JUDGMENT OF THE BOILING WATER

When the ordeal was by boiling water, the priest first performed mass
and then descended to the place of trial, bearing a cross and a book of
the gospels. After he had chanted a litany, he exorcized and blessed the
water, which was to be boiled. He then stripped the accused of his
clothes and arrayed him in ecclesiastical vestment of the kind worn by
an exorcist or a deacon; sprinkled some of the water over him, caused
him to drink of it, and gave him the cross and the gospels to kiss. The
priest having said, "I have given to thee this water for a sign to-day,"
wood was laid under the cauldron, which might be of iron, of brass, of
lead or of clay. As the water grew warmer, prayers were recited by the
priest, and it continued to be heated until it lowed to boiling. The
accused then said the Lord's Prayer, and signed himself with the sign of
the cross; and the cauldron having been quickly set down beside the
fire, the judge held suspended in the water a stone, which the accused,
in the name of God, had to draw forth at the depth of his wrist or his
elbow, according as the ordeal was single or triple. On the third day
his hand was inspected, and his innocence or guilt determined.

THE JUDGMENT OF COLD WATER

The cold water ordeal is in some ways the most interesting of all. In
this instance the accused was thrown into a pond or tank, which was
technically described as the _fossa_ or "pit." If he floated, he was
adjudged guilty; if he sank, his innocence was regarded as divinely
proved. It is sometimes stated "if he floated without any appearance of
swimming," but swimming appears to have been precluded if it be true
that his thumbs were tied to his toes, or he was bound hand and foot!
Grimm explains the principle of this test by tracing it to an old
heathen superstition that the holy element, the pure stream, would
receive no misdoer within it. King James I. in his "Demonologie,"
however, lays it down in the case of witches that they having renounced
their baptism, the element with which the holy rite is performed will
justly reject them. This elucidation is in exact accord with the ancient
formula of consecration pronounced over the accused, which was as
follows:

"May omnipotent God, who did order baptism to be made by water, and did
grant remission of sins to men through baptism; may He, through His
mercy, decree a right judgment through that water. If