procedure, and disregarded all the rules of practice which the Jewish law had established for the protection of one charged with crime, for it was the duty of the judges in criminal cases to examine and cross-examine the wit nesses carefully and to give the accused the benefit of every doubt. In this case the ex amination seems to have been perfunctory and was merely intended to satisfy the mul titude of onlookers and townsmen of Naboth. The judicial murderers having carried out the Queen's order made their return in due form, to wit, " Naboth is stoned and is dead." As soon as the Queen received this mes sage, she said to Ahab, " Arise and take pos session of the vineyard of Naboth, the Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for money, for Naboth is not alive but is dead." Thereupon, Ahab went down to Jezreel for the purpose of taking possession of the cov eted land. The question arises, By what right did the King take possession of the land upon the death of its owner? If Naboth had children, they would inherit; in the absence of children his nearest kinsmen would inherit, so that the inheritance of his fathers would not pass out of his family or tribe. There evidently were several versions of this affair current among the people, for in the passage in sec ond Kings, chapter ix, verse 26, we find ref erence to the fact that Naboth did have sons and that they also fell victims to the covetousness of the King, and were murdered by the Queen's command. It was the law, anciently, that the children were put to death for the crime of the parent, until the law was promulgated, " The parents shall not be put to death for the children, and the children shall not be put to death for the parents; each man shall be put to death for his own crime." ' As Naboth had been convicted and sen-
tenced to death, his children suffered the same punishment. As to the right of the King to take possession of the inheritance, this may have been founded either upon his kinship with Naboth or upon his right as ulfimus hacres in default of lawful heirs. There is nothing'in Jewish law to warrant the be lief that the King or the State had any right to inherit property upon the death of the owner without lawful heirs, nor is there any evidence of forfeiture of the estate of the felon who has been convicted and put to death. We must therefore assume that the King's possession of Naboth's vineyard was simply the act of an autocratic despot. No doubt, Ahab himself would never have dared to take such a step in violation of the ancient custom and laws of his people, but Jezebel, whose character and training had left in her no conscientious scruples on this score, did not hesitate to establish a new precedent for the crown. Although the people were, for the time being, placated by the apparent regularity in the form of the trial of Naboth, they per ceived the motive for the prosecution as soon as the King took possession of Naboth's estate. The Biblical account introduces the prophet Elijah talking with Ahab on the highway and denouncing his crime and threatening him with divine vengeance. "Thus 'saith the Lord, Hast thou killed and also taken possession? In the place where dogs lick the blood of Naboth, shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine." Ahab, overcome with contrition, humbled himself and did penance for the crime, and the prophet was then in formed that the vengeance would not be taken in Ahab's day, "but in his son's days, will the evil be brought upon his house; " and later on (II Kings, chapter ix, verses 25 to 26), when his son, King Jehoram, was slain 1 Deuteronomy, xxiv, 16. This law, found in the Deuter- by Jehu, his body was thrown into the field onomic code was not promulgated until the reign of King of Naboth, the Jezreelite. " For," said Jehu Josiah of Judah, about the year 624, before the Christian era. The consensus of opinion of modern Biblical schol to his companion, " I remember how that when I and thou were riding together, after ars assigns the book of Deuteronomy to this date.
