IS made by the civil suitors who gained or lost their cases, formed a regular source of his income, though he had to account to the State for these receipts. All accounts of fine above the prescribed limit Were credited to the State account. Besides the new Chief Court started at Poona, it further appears that small Provincial Courts with limited jurisdiction, to help the Kamavisdar or Subhedar, were also established in Some of the Districts. In civil cases, the fines paid by the successful suitor and his defeated antagonist were respectively called “Harki and Gunhegari, and the total of civil fines thus recovered seems to have been about 15 per cent. On the value of the matter in dispute, the Gunhegari being about twice the figure for the Harki. In our modern sense of word, Small Cause suits for money due from debtors were very rare under the Maratha rule. As the creditors generally enjoyed large powers of enforcing their dues, by detaining debtors &c., the State" help was only required in the case of powerful persons, and in such cases 25 percent. of the recoveries so made were claimed by the State as a charge for its help. Civil litigation was chiefly confined to Vatan, Adoption, Partition, Partnership, Boundary disputes, and other cases of a like character. The decision was made to rest chiefly on the evidence of the witnesses on both sides, who were examined under the sanction of the most effective oaths and solemn asseverations on the waters of the sacred rivers. After the parties had stated their respective cases, the witnesses' testimony was first recorded, and then the men were called upon to choose their arbitrators from their own or neighbouring villages, and the decision of the Kamavisdars gave effect to the views of the arbitrators. In very rare cases, where the evidence was conflicting, or no evidence could be secured, recourse was had to ordeal, and the decision depended upon the result. Out of some seventy contested cases, the decisions in which are recorded at length in these Diaries, the test of ordeal was made to regulate the verdict in six cases, and even in these six cases, there were only two occasions when the parties challenged each other to the ordeal of fire. In the other four Cases, bathing in the river sufficed to bring out the truth, There was no room for the employment of pleaders. The parties had the right to carry their appeals to the head of the Government, satisfied with the arbitration, called on the parties to select a to whom the case was referred. In all big civil ses, the decision ap pears to have been brought int ra..!. sin.---, - ght into force after Porting to the central atüthorities. Civil Cases. Money Suits. Vatan Suits. who, if not new Punch,
