The prisoner knows that his neighbours expect him to tell the truth
to save them trouble, and will detest him if he does not; he supposes
that we shall have the sense to find out the truth whether he tells
it or not, and then humanity to visit his crime with the punishment
it merits, and no more.
The magistrate asks the prisoner what made him steal; and the
prisoner enters at once into an explanation of the circumstances
which reduced him to the necessity of doing so, and offers to bring
witnesses to prove them; but never dreams of offering to bring
witnesses to prove that he did not steal, if he really had done so;
because the general feeling would be in favour of his doing the one,
and against his doing the other. Tavernier gives an amusing sketch of
Amir Jumla presiding in a court of justice, during a visit he paid
him in the kingdom of Golconda, in the year 1648. (See Book I, Part
II, chap. 11.)[9]
I asked a native law officer, who called on me one day, what he
thought would be the effect of an Act to dispense with oaths on the
Koran and Ganges water, and substitute a solemn declaration made in
the name of God, and under the same penal liabilities, as if the
Koran or Ganges water had been in the deponent's hand.
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