Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 1, 1851).djvu/298

 theft, plunder, or manslaughter, goes to Moscow and asks that such an one be summoned to justice. Nedelsnick is given to him, and he appoints a day, which he announces to the man against whom the accusation is laid, and on that day he brings him to Moscow. Afterwards, when the guilty man is brought to judgment, he often denies the crime which is laid to his charge. If the prosecutor produces witnesses, then both parties are asked whether they will stand to their words. The common reply to that is, "Let the witnesses be heard according to justice and custom." If they bear witness against the guilty man, he immediately objects, makes exceptions against themselves and their testimony, saying: "I demand an oath to be administered to me, and I commit myself to the justice of God, and desire a fair field and a duel." And thus, according to the custom of the country, a duel is adjudged to them. Either of them may appoint any other person to take his place in the duel, and each may supply himself with what arms he pleases, except a gun or a bow. But they generally have oblong coats of mail, sometimes double, a breast-plate, bracelets, a helmet, a lance, a hatchet, and a peculiar weapon in the hand, like a dagger sharpened at each end, which they use so rapidly with either hand as never to allow it to impede them in any encounter, nor to fall from the hand; it is generally used in an engagement on foot. They commence fighting with the lance, and afterwards use other arms. For the last many years the Russians, in fighting with foreigners, whether Germans, or Poles, or Lithuanians, have generally been beaten. But on a very recent occasion, when a certain Lithuanian of twenty-six years of age encountered a certain Russian (who had come off conqueror in more than twenty duels), and was killed, the prince in a rage immediately ordered him to be sent for that he might see him; and when he saw him he spat upon the ground, and ordered that in future no duel should be adjudged to any foreigner against his own subjects. The