Note 52 — DUELS AND ORDEALS.

Very similar to this is the fire-ordeal of the modern Hindoos, which is thus described in Forbes’s Oriental Memoirs, vol. i. c. xi.:—“When a man, accused of a capital crime, chooses to undergo the ordeal trial, he is closely confined for several days; his right hand and arm are covered with thick wax-cloth, tied up and sealed, in the presence of proper officers, to prevent deceit. In the English districts the covering was always sealed with the Company’s arms, and the prisoner placed under an European guard. At the time fixed for the ordeal, a caldron of oil is placed over a fire; when it boils, a piece of money is dropped into the vessel; the prisoner’s arm is unsealed and washed in the presence of his judges and accusers. During this part of the ceremony the attendant Brahmins supplicate the Deity. On receiving their benediction, the accused plunges his hand into the boiling fluid, and takes out the coin. The arm is afterwards again sealed up until the time appointed for a re-examination. The seal is then broken; if no blemish appears, the prisoner is declared innocent; if the contrary, he suffers the punishment due to his crime.”… On this trial the accused thus addresses the element before plunging his hand into the boiling oil:—“Thou, O fire! pervadest all things. O cause of purity! who givest evidence of virtue and of sin, declare the truth in this my hand!” If no juggling were practised, the decisions by this ordeal would be all the same way; but as some are by this means declared guilty, and others innocent, it is clear that the Brahmins, like the Christian priests of the middle ages, practise some deception in saving those whom they wish to be thought guiltless. Return