It is probable that the strictly legal forms were followed on this occasion, although the composition of the gemót was such that justice could not have been done. The same observation will apply to another witena gemót holden in London, after Godwine’s triumphant return to England, though with a very different result. Before this assembly the earl appeared, easily cleared himself of all offences laid to his charge, and obtained the outlawry and banishment from England of all the Frenchmen whose pernicious councils had put dissension between the king and his people. Other examples might be given of outlawry, and even heavier sentences, as blinding, if not death, pronounced by the high court of the witan. But as these are all the result of internal dissensions, they resemble rather the violence of impeachments by an irresistible majority, than the calm, impassive judgments of a judicial assembly[576]. ----- Footnote 576: At a gemót in 1055, earl Ælfgár was outlawed. At a gemót in 1066 at Oxford, earl Tostig was outlawed, etc. ----- Such were the powers of the witena gemót, and it must be confessed that they were extensive. Of the manner of the deliberations or the forms of business we know little, but it is not likely that they were very complicated. We may conclude that the general outline of the proceedings was something of the following order. On common occasions the king summoned his witan to attend him at some royal vill, at Christmas, or at Easter, for festive and ceremonial as well as business purposes. On extraordinary occasions he issued summonses according to the nature of the exigency, appointing the time and place of meeting. When assembled, the witan commenced their session by attending divine service[577], and formally professing their adherence to the catholic faith[578]. The king then brought his propositions before them, in the Frankish manner[579], and after due deliberation they were accepted, modified, or rejected. The reeves, and perhaps on occasion officers specially designated for that service[580], carried the chapters down into the several counties, and there took a _wed_ or pledge from the freemen that they would abide by what had been enacted. This last fact, important to us in more respects than one, is substantiated by the following evidence. Toward the close of the Judicia Civitatis Londoniae (cap. 10), passed in the reign of Æðelstán, and subsidiary to the acts of various gemóts held by him, we find:—“All the witan gave their pledges together to the archbishop at Thundersfield, when Ælfheáh Stybb and Brihtnóð, Odda’s son, came to meet the gemót by the king’s command, that each reeve should take the pledge in his own shire, that they would all hold the frið, as king Æðelstán and the witan had counselled it, first at Greátanleá, and again at Exeter, and afterwards at Feversham, and the fourth time at Thundersfield,” etc. ----- Footnote 577: See vol. i. p. 145 note. Footnote 578: