Each party was permitted to bring with him as many as thirty friends to act as witnesses and compurgators. Lest, however, they might attempt to impede the course of justice, they were required to appear unarmed. Each party had, moreover, the right of being represented by his attorney. The person so employed must be initiated; he must also be the peer of the party, and if he had been engaged on either side he could not, during any stage of the action, be employed on the other, even with the permission of the party which had just engaged him. When he presented himself before the court, his credentials were carefully examined, and if found strictly conformable to what the law had enjoined, they were declared valid. It was necessary that they should have been written on good, new, and sound parchment, without blot or erasure, and be sealed by the seals of at least two frei-schöppen. The attorney of a prince of the empire appeared with a green cross in his right hand, and a golden penny of the empire in his left. He was also to have a glove on his right hand. If there were two attorneys, they were both to bear crosses and pence. The attorney of a simple prince bore a silver penny. The old law, which loves to give a reason for every thing, says, "By the cross they intimate that the prince whom they represent will, in case he should be found guilty, amend his conduct according to the direction of the faith which Jesus Christ preached, and be constant and true to the holy Christian faith, and obedient to the holy empire and justice." All the preliminaries being arranged, the trial commenced by the charge against him being made known to the accused, who was called upon for his defence. If he did not wish to defend himself in person, he was permitted to employ an advocate whom he might have brought with him. If it was a civil suit, he might, however, stay the proceedings at once by giving good security for his satisfying the claims of the plaintiff, in which case he was allowed the usual grace of six weeks and three days. He might also except to the competence of the court, or to the legality of the summons, or to anything else which would, if defective, annul the proceedings. If the accused did not appear, the regular course was for the prosecutor to _overswear_ him; that is, himself to swear by the saints to the truth of what he had stated, and six true and genuine frei-schöppen to swear that they believed him to have spoken the truth.