and, were the suit to be dismissed at once, as with
us, for want of such proof, numbers of innocent
persons would lose the debts really due to them,
through the knavery of the persons indebted, who
would scarce ever fail to deny a debt.”
The Javanese administer an oath on the same
principle, though not so often in civil as in criminal
cases. A murder, for example, has been committed,
and the relations prosecute the person suspected
to have committed it. If there be either no
evidence, or but inadequate evidence, the prisoner
will be directed by the court to swear to his own
innocence. When we are sufficiently aware of the
character of the inhabitants of these countries, the
practice will not appear so unreasonable as it seems
at first view. There are no people who have a more
sacred regard for the sanctity of an oath. In a
court of justice their character appears to great advantage.
Truth and simplicity are the decided
characteristics of their testimony.— There is generally
no legal punishment among them for perjury,
which is left to the vengeance of the invisible
powers. The laws of the Malays alone punish
this offence, and the code of Malacca describes the
kind of punishment in one case as follow : “ If a
person give false evidence before the Intendant of
the Port, his face shall be streaked with charcoal
and turmeric, and he shall be publicly exposed j or
be fined to the amount of two tahils.” Among
some of the tribes, collateral oaths are deemed necessary,
and the testimony of an accused person
must be corroborated by that of others, somewhat
in the manner of the compurgators of the middle
ages of Europe. Among those people, however,
it is the relations of. the deceased alone that are
sworn. Marsden gives the following interesting
account of the practice : “ In administering an
oath, if the matter litigated respects the property
of the grandfather, all the collateral branches
of the family descended from him are understood
to be included in its operation; if the father’s
effects only are concerned, or the transactions happened
in his lifetime, his descendants are included;
if the affair regards only the present parties, and
originated with them, they and their immediate descendants
only are comprehended in the consequences
of the oath ; and if any single one of these
descendants refuses to join in the oath, it vitiates
the whole; that is, it has the same effect as if the
party himself refused to swear; a case that not
unfrequently occurs. It may be observed, that the
spirit of this custom tends to the requiring a weight
of evidence, and an increase of the importance of
the oath, in proportion as the distance of time renders
the fact to be established less capable of proof
in the ordinary way.” #
* History of Sumatra, p. 241.