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A Treatise on Estates and Tenures, Ed. by Sir C.h. Chambers
A Treatise on Estates and Tenures Ed by Sir Ch Chambers Author:Robert Chambers Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 50 CHAPTER II. OF FEE TAIL. The feudal law is evidently founded entirely on this supposition : that all proper feuds were originally given in considerat... more »ion of personal service, and on condition that the vassal should always be ready to assist his lord with his sword in battle, and by his judicial attendance in the feudal court, when he should be called upon, (a) From this position it naturally followed that no feudal tenant could alien the whole of his land without a licence from the lord of the fee. (6) For he could not alien it to be held of his lord, since that were to substitute another soldier in his stead without the consent of his captain ; and if he had granted it to another to hold of himself, he must then have remained bound to perform the stipulated services, though he had deprived himself of that which was to support him while he served; an enormity not to be suffered in a military constitution. (a) Craig, lib. 1. tit. 0. () Feud. lib. 2. tit. 52. 55. Neither could the lord part with his manor and the services annexed thereto without the attorn- ment or formal consent of the feudal tenants. (c) For which Bractori assigns this reason, that if the lord had such power he might oblige his tenants to become subject, and take the oath of fidelity to one that was their deadly enemy. (/) In England lands were not in general held as stipendiary feuds militics gratia, till feudal tenure was by one general law soon after the Norman Conquest superinduced upon all free lands. It was therefore natural to expect, that the severe restraints of the feudal law should, among us, soon wear away. Accordingly we find, that though tenants could not in general lawfully alien or transfer the tenure itself so as to substitute other tenants in their own stead, because, as wa...« less