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1582–1583]
FOUNDATION OF AUDIENCIA
309

the said fees shall not be able to sign his name, let another sign for him. When the case or affair is finished, the said clerk or relator, and the party, or his attorney or agent, shall swear that they have not accepted or given more fees for that case or affair than that which is there entered and signed; and that, if they shall accept or give more, they will enter and sign it as has been said. The penalty of the first offense is a requirement to repay fourfold to our exchequer that which is taken otherwise than as herein ordained; for the second, the same penalty and dismissal from office; and if the party or the attorney shall give information that he has given moneys to the said clerk, and they shall not be endorsed as aforesaid, let him be believed on his oath as to the amount that he shall have given.

139. [Clerks and commissioners are to undertake no official investigations without signed warrant from the court. Penalty: two years' suspension and a hundred pesos for the first offense, and dismissal for the second.]

140. [More than one demand [peticion] in appeals is not to be accepted from either party. Penalty: two pesos.]

141. [Abbreviations or numbers in dates are not permitted, for fear of fraud. Penalty: damages of the parties and twenty pesos for the exchequer and court-rooms.]

142. [Memoranda of testimony in criminal cases must be given to the fiscal for correction. Penalty: four pesos.]

143. [Clerks in all depositions are to put questions as to age and the like, to avoid fraud. Penalty: two pesos to the court room.]