Causes C&lebres. customs of the particular people. In Wales there was a species of purgation, denominated Assath, existing at the beginning of the fif teenth century, in which the number of compurgators amounted to three hundred. Twelve, however, appears to have been the usual number, including the party himself. Upon a superficial view of the subject it might seem that the custom of compurgation was calculated to prevent the perjury which would have ensued if the decision of a ques tion had been left to the oath of the accused alone. But when we consider that at the period when it generally prevailed, the ties
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of consanguinity and clanship were regarded as superior to all other obligations, we shall find that the security was rather apparent than real. It cannot, therefore, surprise us that the complaints of the prevalence of false-swearing were universal. Trial by compurgation, thus respectable in its origin, became the inheritance of the English; and they preserved it, as we have already said, to a comparatively recent period, with that jealous affection and filial rever ence which have converted their code into a species of museum of antiques and legal curiosities. — The Jurist.
CAUSES CÉLÈBRES. XVII. MONTHLY. [1842.] ON the 22d of November, 1842, a curious crowd was gathered in the court of the Messageries Generates, at Orleans. The Procureur du Roi, a commissary of police, several agents, and numerous gendarmes had just made a descent upon the building of that establishment devoted to the storage of baggage. While the Procureur du Roi was examin ing the register of departures, a man named Bernard, who kept the H6tel de l'Europe, in the Rue de la Hallebarde, approached the commissary of police, and pointing to an enormous trunk lying upon the ground, said, " That is it." Upon forcing the lock of this trunk, a frightful discovery was made. Its contents were ghastly in the extreme. A human body, horribly mutilated, was disclosed to the eyes of the spectators. Upon a sign from the Procureur du Roi, a man who had up to this moment kept in the background approached, and at the sight of the garments which still remained upon the body, cried, 29
"It is indeed our clerk at the bank, our poor Boisselier!" Early on the morning of the 21st, Bois selier had departed from the bank to collect the amounts due upon certain accepted bills of exchange, of the value, in all, of 8,310 francs. Hours passed, night came, and Boisselier had not returned. Anxiety, and then alarm, prevailed on his account. What had become of him? In the absence of the manager of the bank, one of the directors, M. Chavannes, notified the Procureur du Roi of this strange disappearance. Inquiry disclosed the fact that the moneys the miss ing clerk should have collected had been received by a man who was certainly not Boisselier, but who had nevertheless pre sented the bills for payment. The descrip tion given of this man was that he was short, thick-set, of dark complexion, with black hair and mustache. Boisselier was forty years of age; he had been married nine years, and lived in the banking-house with his wife. Upon being
