the handwriting of the party, is to be
received as proof, although it be not witnessed, unless procured by
violence or by fraud.[166]

90. Payment of a debt incurred upon a writing, is obligatory only upon
the debtor, his son, and grand-son;[167] but a pledge shall remain in
use so long as the debt is unpaid.

91. If the instrument be in a foreign country, be illegibly written,
be destroyed, faded, stolen, mutilated, burned, or torn, [the Court]
shall direct a new one to be made.

92. The authenticity of a written instrument which is doubtful, is to
be ascertained by [comparison with other] documents in the handwriting
of the party &c.,[168] by [enquiry into] the probability of its having
been obtained,[169] and [the mode of] its preparation, by [observation
of] any marks, by [enquiry of] the relation [in which the parties
stand to each other], and how the matter came about.

93. As often as the debtor makes a payment, either he shall write an
indorsement to that effect on the document, or the creditor shall give
a receipt under his hand.

94. When the debt is paid, [the debtor] shall cause the document to be
torn up, or shall have another prepared, _viz._ of discharge. If the
debt was incurred before witnesses, its payment should also be before
witnesses.[170]

95. The scales, fire, water, poison, the sacred draught--these are
the ordeals for exculpation,[171] in case of grave accusations, if the
accuser be prepared to pay a fine.

96. When it is agreed on; one of the parties shall perform [the
ordeal], the other be in readiness to pay the fine. Even without a
fine, there shall be trial by ordeal in case of treason or great
crime.

97. [The accused,] being summoned, shall, after bathing at sunrise and
fasting, be made to go through the several ordeals, in presence of the
monarch and the brahmans.

98. The scales are [the ordeal] for women, children, aged men, the
blind, the lame, brahmans, and those afflicted with disease. Fire
or water, or the seven barleycorns' weight of poison are [the ordeal]
for a Sudra.

99. For a less value than a thousand _panas_, one shall not go
through the ordeal of the [heated] iron plough-share, of poison, or of
the scales: but in case of offence against the monarch or great crime,
purifications[172] shall always be gone through.

100. When the accused has been placed in the scales by those who
understand the art of weighing, a counter-weight adjusted, and a line
drawn, he