owry where
a party is bound to do so, refusal to pay interest on money borrowed at
12 per cent., or where a man desirous of setting up business in the
market has borrowed from another man capital to start with; also cases
of slander, cases arising out of friendly loans or partnerships, and
cases concerned with slaves, cattle, and the office of trierarch, or
with banks. These are brought up as 'monthly' cases and are introduced
by these officers; but the Receivers-General perform the same function
in cases for or against the farmers of taxes. Those in which the sum
concerned is not more than ten drachmas they can decide summarily, but
all above that amount they bring into the law-courts as 'monthly' cases.

Part 53

The Forty are also elected by lot, four from each tribe, before whom
suitors bring all other cases. Formerly they were thirty in number, and
they went on circuit through the demes to hear causes; but after the
oligarchy of the Thirty they were increased to forty. They have full
powers to decide cases in which the amount at issue does not exceed ten
drachmas, but anything beyond that value they hand over to the
Arbitrators. The Arbitrators take up the case, and, if they cannot
bring the parties to an agreement, they give a decision. If their
decision satisfies both parties, and they abide by it, the case is at
an end; but if either of the parties appeals to the law-courts, the
Arbitrators enclose the evidence, the pleadings, and the laws quoted in
the case in two urns, those of the plaintiff in the one, and those of
the defendant in the other. These they seal up and, having attached to
them the decision of the arbitrator, written out on a tablet, place
them in the custody of the four justices whose function it is to
introduce cases on behalf of the tribe of the defendant. These officers
take them and bring up the case before the law-court, to a jury of two
hundred and one members in cases up to the value of a thousand
drachmas, or to one of four hundred and one in cases above that value.
No laws or pleadings or evidence may be used except those which were
adduced before the Arbitrator, and have been enclosed in the urns.

The Arbitrators are persons in the sixtieth year of their age; this
appears from the schedule of the Archons and the Eponymi. There are two
classes of Eponymi, the ten who give their names to the tribes, and the
forty-two of the years of service. The youths, on being enrolled among
the