in the criminal law. The next step towards the punishment of offenders after COMMITMENT, is their prosecution, or the manner of their formal accusation. And this, in the English law, is either upon a previous finding of the fact by an inquest or grand jury; or without such previous finding.

The former way is either by PRESENTMENT or INDICTMENT. See these articles.

The remaining methods of prosecution are without any previous finding by a jury, to fix the authoritative stamp of verisimilitude upon the accusation. One of these, by the common law, was when a thief was taken with the mainour, that is, with the thing stolen upon him, in manu. For he might, when so detected, Agravante delicto, be brought into court, arraigned, and tried, without indictment: as by the Danish law he might be taken and hanged upon the spot without accusation or trial. But this proceeding was taken away by several statutes in the reign of Edward III., though in Scotland a similar process remains to this day. So that the only species of proceeding at the suit of the king, without a previous indictment or presentment by a grand jury, now seems to be that of INFORMATION; which see.

These are all the methods of prosecution at the suit of the king. There yet remains another, which is merely at the suit of the subject, and is called an APPEAL. See that article.

But of all the methods of prosecution, that by indictment is the most general. See INDICTMENT.