have occurred of extreme suffering, on the part of the criminal, caused by the unskilfulness of the executioner in beheading with the sword, this mode of execution has been abolished.  Beheading in Prussia is now always performed with a heavy axe, the sufferer being previously tied to a block.  In France, during the revolutionary government, beheading by means of a machine, the guillotine, came into use, and still prevails there, to the exclusion of all other modes of capital punishment.  A person who has murdered his father or mother, however, has his right arm cut off the moment before he is guillotined.  In the middle ages, it was, in some states, the duty of the youngest magistrates to perform the executions with the sword.  In China, it is well known that beheading is practised, sometimes accompanied with the most studied torments.  In the United States of America, beheading is unknown, the halter being the only instrument of capital punishment.  In many European countries, beheading with the sword still prevails.

P.

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PRICE OF BLOOD.—­WERE AND WERELADE.

Were, or Wera, in our old law books, signifies what was anciently paid for killing a man.  When such crimes were punished with pecuniary mulets, not death, the price was set on every man’s head, according to his condition and quality.

Werelade, among the Saxons, was the denying of a homicide on oath, in order to be quit of the fine, or forfeiture, called were.  If the party denied the fact, he was to purge himself, by the oaths of several persons, according to his degree and quality.  If the guilt amounted to four pounds, he was to have eighteen jurors on his father’s side, and four on his mother’s:  if to twenty-four pounds, he was to have sixty jurors, and this was called werelade.

Weregild, or Weregeld, was the price of a man’s head; which was paid partly to the king for the loss of his subject, partly to the lord whose vassal he was, and partly to the next of kin.

“In the same manner (says Blackstone,) by the Irish brehon law, in case of murder, the brehon or judge, compounded between the murderer and the friends of the deceased, who prosecuted him, by causing the malefactor to give unto them, or to the child or wife of him that was slain, a recompense, which they called eriach.  And thus we find in our Saxon laws, particularly those of King Athelstan, the several weregilds for homicide, established in progressive order, from the death of the ceorl or peasant, up to that of the king himself.”

The weregild of an archbishop, and of an earl, was 15,000 thrismas; that of a bishop or alderman, 8,000; that of a general or governor, 4,000; that of a priest or thane, 2,000; that of a king, 30,000; half to be paid to his kindred, and the other half to the public.  The weregild of a ceorl was 266 thrismas.