In practice the _Audiencia_ usually treated the finding of the lower court as sentence (not merely opinion), and confirmed it, if no new testimony were produced and there were no errors of law. But, although the opinion of the lower court might be practically an acquittal, the _Audiencia_ might find errors of law, thus placing the accused twice in jeopardy. If the case were remitted back, in view of new testimony, it finally returned to the _Audiencia_ for decision, nine judges being required to give their opinion in a grave case, so that if the Court of First Instance and five judges of the _Audiencia_ found the accused guilty, there was a majority against him. The sentencing court was always the _Audiencia_. If the sentence were against the accused, a final appeal could be made, by "writ of error," to the Supreme Court of Spain, whose decision, however, rested not on facts, but on errors of law. The (American) Insular Government tacitly admitted that the Spanish written law was excellent, notwithstanding its fulfilment being dilatory. The Spanish Penal Code has been adopted in its general application, but a new code, based on it, was in course of compilation in 1904. The application of the Spanish Code occasionally evolves some curious issues, showing its variance with fundamental American law. For instance, in September, 1905, a native adulteress having been found by her husband _in flagrante delicto_, he stabbed her to death. The Spanish law sustains the husband's right to slay his faithless consort and her paramour, in such circumstances (_vide_ p. 80), but provides that the lawful slayer shall be banished from the country. The principle of this law is based on Roman law, human instinctive reasoning, and the spirit of the law among the Latin nations of Europe. American law assumes this natural act of the husband to be a crime, but whilst admitting the validity of the Spanish Code in these Islands, the American bench was puzzled to decide what punishment could be inflicted if the arraigned husband committed contempt of court by thereafter returning to his native land. CHAPTER XV Trade of the Islands Its Early History