The formal proclamation of a charge of manslaughter against the accused was the initial act of the ‘prosecution’ which, after a period of inquiry, after examination of witnesses, and after various other formalities, ultimately culminated in the formal trial of the accused at the Palladium court. But, as it stands, this quotation from Demosthenes suggests, _prima facie_, that trial could be dispensed with if the deceased had near relations who unanimously consented to accept ‘appeasement’: and that it was only in the absence of relatives that a trial took place, after which the phrateres, who were merely neighbours, negotiated the appeasement. But this _prima facie_ inference arises from the clumsy and unscientific wording of the law. That the inference is logically invalid is obvious from the simple fact that, in the absence of relatives of the deceased, the slayer could not be tried at all! When the law says ‘if there are none of these,’ it must be taken to mean ‘if none of the groups which are privileged to decide about appeasement can be brought to unanimity.’ It is an extraordinary thing, that in this Demosthenic citation of the law relating to manslaughter there is no _certain_ reference to the penalty of exile. Are we to assume that such a penalty was not legally compulsory, that it was merely a fortuitous eventuality which depended entirely on the attitude of the relatives to ‘appeasement’? Are we to suppose that if all the relatives concerned agreed to be ‘appeased’ immediately after the trial and the verdict, the manslayer could have remained at home precisely as in the old wergeld days? We have no doubt that so far as the relatives of the slain were concerned, he could have remained at home. But could he have been admitted to purgation? Was he not ‘polluted’ if the dying man did not ‘release’ him? Could he have ignored the anger of the gods and of the slain? The laws of Dracon do not directly assist us in answering these questions: on the contrary, by their obscure wording they suggest frequently the wrong answer. But we have seen[64] that these laws can only be explained as a ‘compromise.’ In the wergeld system of tribal Greek societies in pre-historic days, there was a regular and scientific method of ‘appeasement’ which, in most kinds of homicide, was recognised as a solvent of the feud. But in the Draconian code ‘appeasement’ appears in a degenerate and insignificant aspect. It is subordinated to other penalties which are not stated with any degree of emphasis, for the simple reason that they were universally familiar. All the arguments which we have put forward in support of our theory of a ‘compromise’ in Attic law compel us to assume that exile was an essential ingredient of the penalty for manslaughter. Such an assumption is implied in the reading ἐσέσθων (let them permit to return) occurring in the Draconian inscription. Demosthenes, unfortunately, has αἰδεσάσθων, which refers merely to ‘appeasement.’ As we should have