After that everybody stood while the new Judge took the oath of fealty to the King. Then the Deemster's clerk, Joshua Scarff, in his coloured spectacles, handed up a quarto copy of the Bible and a deep hush fell on the assembly, for the time had come for the Deemster's oath.
The Governor and Stowell rose again, but all others remained seated. Each laid one hand on the open Book, and the Governor read the oath, clause by clause in loud, strong tones that seemed to smite the walls as with blows. And, clause by clause, Stowell repeated it after him in a lower voice that was sometimes barely audible:
"By this Book and the holy contents thereof...."
"By this Book and the holy contents thereof...."
"And by all the wonderful works which God hath miraculously wrought in heaven and on the earth beneath in six days and seven nights, I, Victor Christian Stowell...."
"I, Victor Christian Stowell, do swear that I will, without respect or fear or friendship, love or gain, consanguinity or affinity, envy or malice, execute the laws of this isle justly betwixt our Sovereign Lord the King and his subjects within the isle, and betwixt party and party, man and man, man and woman...."
".... man and woman ...."
".... as indifferently as the herring bone doth lie down the middle of the fish."
There was a deep silence until the oath was ended and then a general drawing of breath.
The Governor and the new Deemster sat and the Clerk of the Rolls handed up the Liber Juramentorum, the Book of Oaths, a large volume in faded leather with leaves of discoloured parchment.