41 



Gentiles were the Coiri fir, and Crandcur Cutruma (mutual lots), and 

 Airisium im Altoir (waiting at an altar). Hence has arisen the custom 

 of putting lots in reliquaries, still practised by the Gaeidhel." 



It is to be regretted that we are not able to fix the date of the ori- 

 ginal composition of the tract from which these passages have been 

 extracted; but probably the concluding sentence of the foregoing para- 

 graph is only an observation added by the scribe of " The Book of Bal- 

 lymote," who wrote about the year 1391. I am afraid the description 

 of the gold and silver vessel which was set to boil over a fire is rather 

 imaginative, and indeed I am inclined to doubt the alleged antiquity 

 of the hot water Ordeal in this country at all. The statement that the 

 " Cauldron of Truth" was one of the three most usual forms of Ordeal 

 with Gentiles, I consider to refer to the Gentiles of other countries. 



The next form is : — 



Secmcpcmt) Sm .1. Cpanbcup Sin mic Qi^i .1. cpi cpcmt> bo cup 

 an upci .i. cpano na placha -j cpanb m ollamam -] cpanb 111 

 Itctft. Oa mbec cm aga ceigeo a cpanb an iccap ; biamab 

 annoc, imoppo, ceigeo ap uaccap. 



" Seanerand Sin, i.e., the charmed branch of Sen, son of Aige, viz. : — 

 Three lots were put in water— the Prince's lot, the Ollamh'slot, and the 

 lot of the litigant. If the litigant was guilty, his lot went to the bottom ; 

 but if indeed he was innocent, it came to the surface." 



This Sen Mac Aige is mentioned in the Irish Law Tracts as a dis- 

 tinguished Judge, who lived before the time of St. "Patrick, and whose 

 judgments were necessarily delivered with care, because whenever he 

 delivered a false opinion his cheek became disfigured by three blotches. 

 The principle of the cold water Ordeal here indicated is directly opposed 

 to that which obtained in the other European countries. In Germany, 

 England, France, and the Continent generally, when this test was re- 

 sorted to, the accused, having a rope fastened round his body, was cast 

 into the water ; if he floated on the surface, he was deemed guilty ; if he 

 sank, he was deemed innocent, and immediately drawn out. On this sub- 

 ject Grimm remarks : — " Herein an old Heathen superstition seems to 

 prevail, that the holy element, the pure stream, will receive within it 

 no misdoer" (" D. E. A.," p. 923). It is possible, also, that the notion 

 that the criminal would not sink implied some subtle idea of demoniacal 

 possession, and of the nature of a spirit. The belief that a witch could 

 not sink was painfully illustrated in England about two years ago, in 

 the case of a poor man who, on suspicion of witchcraft, was worried to 

 death by a crowd of people, who threw him into the water to see if he 

 would sink. 



But, if the Irish notion implied in the foregoing form differed 

 from the idea prevalent amongst the European nations, it seems to have 

 agreed with the opinion current among the Jews and other Eastern 

 peoples. It will be remembered, for instance, that the axe head which 



E.I.A, PEOC, — VOL, X. & 



