prisoner, and deliver up his arms; in which case he may detain him thirty days: but if he refuse to deliver up his arms, it is then lawful to fight him. A slave may fight in his master's quarrel: a father may fight in his son's with any one, except with his master [s]. [FN [r] The addition of these last words in Italics appears necessary from what follows in the same law. [s] LL. Aelfr. Sec. 28 Wilkins, p. 43.] It was enacted by King Ina, that no man should take revenge for an injury till he had first demanded compensation, and had been refused it [t]. [FN [t] LL. Inae, Sec. 9.] King Edmond, in the preamble to his laws, mentions the general misery occasioned by the multiplicity of private feuds and battles; and he establishes several expedients for remedying this grievance. He ordained that if any one commit murder, be may, with the assistance of his kindred, pay within a twelvemonth the fine of his crime; and if they abandon him, he shall alone sustain the deadly feud or quarrel with the kindred of the murdered person: his own kindred are free from the feud, but on condition that they neither converse with the criminal, nor supply him with meat or OTHER NECESSARIES: if any of them, after renouncing him, receive him into their house, OR GIVE HIM ASSISTANCE, they are finable to the king, and are involved in the feud. If the kindred of the murdered person take revenge on any but the criminal himself, AFTER HE IS ABANDONED BY HIS KINDRED, all their property is forfeited, and they are declared to be enemies to the king and all his friends [u]. It is also ordained, that the fine for murder shall never be remitted by the king [w]; and that no criminal shall be killed who flies to the church, or any of the king’s towns [x]; and the king himself declares, that his house shall give no protection to murderers, till they have satisfied the church by their penance, and the kindred of the deceased, by making compensation [y]. The method appointed for transacting this composition is found in the same law [z]. [FN [u] LL. Edm. Sec. 1. Wilkins, p. 73. [w] LL. Edm. Sec. 3. [x] Ibid. Sec. 2. [y] Ibid. Sec. 4. [z] Ibid Sec. 7.] These attempts of Edmond, to contract and diminish the feuds, were contrary to the ancient spirit of the northern barbarians, and were a step towards a more regular administration of justice. By the Salic law, any man might, by a public declaration, exempt himself from his family quarrels: but then he was considered by the law as no longer belonging to the family; and he was deprived of all right of succession, as the punishment of his cowardice [a]. [FN [a] Tit. 63.]