the lord and tenant, from the extinction of the blood of the latter by either natural or civil means: if he died without heirs of his blood, or if his blood was corrupted and stained by commission of treason or felony; whereby every inheritable quality was entirely blotted out and abolished. In such cases the land escheated, or fell back, to the lord of the fee; that is, the tenure was determined by breach of the original condition, expressed or implied in the feudal donation. In the one case, there were no heirs subsisting of the blood of the first feudatory or purchaser, to which heirs alone the grant of the feud extended: in the other, the tenant, by perpetrating an atrocious crime, shewed that he was no longer to be trusted as a vassal, having forgotten his duty as a subject; and therefore forfeited his feud, which he held under the implied condition that he should not be a traitor or a felon. consequence of which in both cases was, that the gift, being determined, resulted back to the lord who gave it.

The

These were the principal qualities, fruits, and consequences of the tenure by knight-service: a tenure, by which the greatest part of the lands in this kingdom were holden, and that principally of the king in capite, till the middle of the last century. There were also some other species of knight-service; so called, though improperly, because the service or render was of a free and honourable nature, and equally uncertain as to the time of rendering as that of knight-service proper, and because they were attended with similar fruits

and consequences. Such was the tenure by grand serjeanty, per magnum servitium, whereby the tenant was bound, instead of serving the king generally in his wars, to do some special honorary service to the king in person; as to carry his banner, his sword, or the like; or to be his butler, champion, or other officer, at his coronation. Tenure by cornage, which was, to wind a horn, when the Scots or other enemies entered the land, in order to warn the king's subjects, was (like other services of this nature) a species of grand serjeanty.

These services, both of chivalry and grand serjeanty, were all personal, and uncertain as to their quantity or duration. But, the personal attendance in knight-service growing troublesome and inconvenient in many respects, the tenants found means of compounding for it; by first sending others in their stead, and in process of time making a pecuniary satisfaction to the lords in lieu of it. This pecuniary satisfaction at last came to be levied by assessments, at so much for every knight's fee; and therefore this kind of tenure was called scutagium in Latin, or servitium scuti; scutum being then a well-known denomination of money; and in like manner it was called, in our Norman French, escuage; being indeed a pecuniary, instead of a military service. It is held in our old books, that escuage or scutage could not be levied but by consent of parliament; such scutages being indeed the groundwork of all succeeding subsidies, and the land-tax of later times.

CHAPTER VI.

OF THE MODERN ENGLISH TENURES.

By the statute 12 Car. II. the tenures of socage and frankalmoign, the honorary services of grand serjeanty, and the tenure by copy of court roll, were reserved; nay all tenures in general, except frankalmoign, grand serjeanty, and copyhold, were reduced to one general species of tenure, then well known and subsisting, called free and common socage.

Socage, in its most general and extensive signification, seems to denote a tenure by any certain and determinate service. And in this sense it is by our ancient writers constantly put in opposition to chivalry, or knight-service, where the render was precarious and uncertain.

Socage is of two sorts: free-socage, where the services are not only certain, but honourable; and villein-socage, where the services, though certain, are of a baser nature. Of free-socage tenure we are first to speak; and this, both in the nature of its service, and the fruits and consequences appertaining thereto, was always by much the most free and independent species of any. And therefore I cannot but assent to Mr. Somner's etymology of the word; who derives it from the Saxon appellation, soc, which signifies liberty or privilege, and, being joined to a usual termination, is called socage,

in Latin socagium; signifying thereby a free or privileged tenure.

As therefore the grand criterion and distinguishing mark of this species of tenure are the having its renders or services ascertained, it will include under it all other methods of holding free lands by certain and invariable rents and duties: and, in particular, petit serjeanty, tenure in burgage, and gavelkind.

Now petit serjeanty bears a great resemblance to grand serjeanty; for as the one is a personal service, so the other is a rent or render, both tending to some purpose relative to the king's person. Petit serjeanty, as defined by Littleton, consists in holding lands of the king by the service of rendering to him annually some small implement of war, as a bow, a sword, a lance, an arrow, or the like. This, he says, is but socage in effect: for it is no personal service, but a certain rent: and, we may add, it is clearly no predial service, or service of the plough, but in all respects liberum et commune socagium; only, being held of the king, it is by way of eminence dignified with the title of parvum servitium regis, or petit serjeanty.

Tenure in burgage is where the king or other person is lord of an ancient borough, in which the tenements are held by a rent certain. It is indeed only a kind of town socage; as common socage, by which other lands are holden, is usually of a rural nature. A borough, as we have formerly seen, is distinguished from other towns by the right of sending members to parliament; and,

where the right of election is by burgage tenure, that alone is a proof of the antiquity of the borough. Tenure in burgage, therefore, or burgage tenure, is where houses, or lands which were formerly the scite of houses, in an ancient borough, are held of some lord in common socage, by a certain established rent.

It is

The nature of the tenure in gavelkind. universally known what struggles the Kentish men made to preserve their ancient liberties, and it is principally in them that we meet with the custom of gavelkind, (though it was and is to be found in some other parts of the kingdom). The distinguishing properties of this tenure are various: some of the principal are these: 1. The tenant is of age sufficient to aliene his estate by feoffment at the age of fifteen. 2. The estate does not escheat in case of an attainder and execution for felony; their maxim being, "the father to the bough, the son to the plough." 3. In most places he had a power of devising lands by will, before the statute for that purpose was made. 4. The lands descend, not to the eldest, youngest, or any one son only, but to all the sons together; which was indeed anciently the most usual course of descent all over England, though in particular places particular customs prevailed.

III. Copyhold tenures, although very meanly descended, yet come of an ancient house; for, it appears, that copyholders are in truth no other but villeins, who, by a long series of immemorial encroachments on the lord, have at last established