al
sentences like the Cymric triads. The marked
alliteration of the Anglo-Saxon laws is to be referred
to the same cause, and in the Frisic laws several
passages are evidently written in verse. From hence,
also, may originate those quaint and pithy rhymes in
which the doctrines of the law of the old time are not
unfrequently recorded."[127]

Again, the editors of the Brehon Law Tracts point out that early laws
are handed down "in a rhythmical form; always in language condensed
and antiquated they assume the character of abrupt and sententious
proverbs. Collections of such sayings are found scattered throughout
the Brehon Law Tracts."[128] The sagas contain many verses which
partake of the character of legal formulae, and in Beowulf there seems
to be a definite example. It occurs in the passage describing Beowulf
engaged in his fatal combat with the fiery dragon, when his
"companions," stricken with terror, deserted him, on which Wiglaf
pronounced the following malediction:--

"Now shall the service of treasure,
and the gifts of swords,
all joy of paternal inheritance,
all support
of all your kin depart;
every one of your family
must go about
deprived of his rights
of citizenship;
when far and wide
the nobles shall learn
your flight,
your dishonourable deed.
Death is better
to every warrior
than disgraced life."

Mr. Kemble remarks on this passage, that it is not improbable that the
whole denunciation is a judicial formula, such as we know early
existed, and in regular rhythmical measure.[129]

These early examples may be followed up by others preserved to modern
times. The most significant of these occurs in the Church ceremony of
marriage, which preserves in the vernacular the ancient rhythmical
formula of the marriage laws, and the antiquity of the Church ritual
is proved from the fact that it is accompanied and enforced by the old
rhythmical verse, which is indicative of early legal or ceremonious
usage.

"With this rynge I the wed
And this gold and silver I the geve,
and with my body I the worshipe,
and with all my worldely cathel I the endowe."[130]

Sir Francis Palgrave has noticed the subject, and points out that the
wife is taken

"to have and to hold[131]
from this day forward
for better, for worse,
for ri