So far we have dealt only with the _receivers_ of the wergeld. We have now to consider the wergeld from the _payers’_ point of view. When at last we turn to the title ‘_De chrenecruda_,’ which deals with the _payment_ of the wergeld by the slayer and his kindred, we seem all at once to breathe in the atmosphere of ancient tribal custom before it had been materially tainted by the new influences, which the conquest of a Romanised country and migration into the midst of a mixed population necessarily brought with them. The force of tribal instinct survives in this clause even though since the edict of Childebert II. it may have been allowed to remain in the Lex partly on sufferance, and even though some of its details have been made incoherent by the mutilation it may have undergone. It was probably left in its place in the Lex, together with the clauses regarding the receipt of wergeld, because, even though the assistance of the kindred in the payment of wergeld had been made optional and discouraged, the instincts of kindred were not to be extinguished all at once. To save the life of a kinsman, kinsmen will sometimes exercise the option. And the slayer, before he flees for his life, will make his appeal to his kinsmen. The old traditional rules for payment will have force in the feelings of those who, under all the discouragements of the law, still choose to assist the slayer. Moreover, the Mallus, it appears, still exercised jurisdiction over the option. This celebrated clause may perhaps therefore be quoted as evidence for so much of ancient tribal custom as to wergelds as the royal edict was unable to extinguish all at once. [Sidenote: The title ‘De chrenecruda.’] Difficulty arises chiefly from the imperfect condition of the text of one of the clauses. But, keeping close to Codex I. of Hessels and Kern’s edition, the following translation may pass for our purpose (Tit. LVIII.): (1) Si quis hominem occiderit et, totam facultatem data, non habuerit unde tota lege conpleat, xii juratores donare debet [quod] nec super terram nec subtus terram plus facultatem non habeat quam jam donavit. If any one shall kill a man and, having given up all he possesses, he yet shall not have enough to satisfy the whole legal requirement, he ought to give the oaths of twelve co-swearers that neither above the earth nor under the earth he has any more property than he has already given up. (2) Et postea debet in casa sua introire et de quattuor angulos terræ in pugno collegere et sic postea in duropullo, hoc est in limitare, stare debet intus in casa respiciens, et sic de sinistra manum de illa terra trans scapulas suas jactare super illum quem proximiorem parentem habet.