Note 296 — Chapter VII

The most common ordeals are the trial by water (swimming across a river, remaining some time under water, etc.) and that by fire. In the latter case the accused is made to run on hot coals, as in India, among the Somalis, in Siam; to lick red-hot iron, as among the Dyaks, the Khonds, the Negroes of Sierra-Leone; or again, to dip the hands in molten lead, as in Burma among the Jakuns of Malacca, or the Alfurus of Buru, etc.