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the soil, in the practice among the coheirs, in agricultural countries, if they cannot conveniently cultivate the property in common, for one of them to take it and pay a rent to the others; or, in richer and more commercial districts, to buy them out.

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To this universal and most natural attachment to the soil, and its suitableness as property, under whatever system of succession, for preserving the memory and influence of a family, may be added its peculiar value among ourselves, as connected with primogeniture, in preserving the independence of the aristocratic branch of our constitution. privileges rather for the public advantage than their own, less violent and more consistent than the multitude, if, in past ages, a tyrant was to be coerced or expelled, or in présent times, a sovereign is to be advised, the arms and the counsel of our nobility have ever been found equally prompt. Without them, whatever may be the individual merits, the many are as a rope of sand.'

Our author may be justly proud in having his own sentiments on this important subject supported by those of the most philosophic statesman of modern times.

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The law of primogeniture, (says Mr. Burke,) with a few inconsiderable exceptions, is the standing law of all our landed inheritance, and without question has a tendency (I think a most happy tendency) to preserve a character of consequence, weight, and prevalent interest over others, in the whole body of the landed interest.'-Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs.

From this statement of the case in favour of our old English system, the author turns to the other side of the picture, as presented by the Code Napoleon, which, as he observes, in establishing equal partibility among all the children, and all other kindred of equal degree, has not only prescribed a system of succession the opposite to ours, but has given that system a more unbending character, by prohibiting, to a large extent, voluntary gifts, either inter vivos or testamentary. Our space precludes us from following the author with any closeness through this part of his argument; which is, however, of sufficient force and originality to merit (as it is sure to attract) the attention of our continental neighbours, so recently engaged in the revision of that very article of their laws of which it is his design to call in question the wisdom and expediency.

Land,' he observes,' is, in its nature, incapable of the same easy and complete division as money and other moveables.' The truth of this maxim, in itself sufficiently obvious, is made practically familiar to us by the expensive and vexatious nature of our own proceedings under a commission of partition. These evils among ourselves are confined to a small number of cases, and a very limited description of persons. That, which forms our exception, constitutes their general rule of succession-with this addition,

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addition, that (unless our author has greatly erred in his estimate) all the inconvenience and expense of a partition among English coheirs occur, in a much greater proportion, in the case of every single succession, regulated by the provisions of the civil code of France. The author thus sunis up the comparison.

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From an engraftment of good sense on good fortune, the English law appears to possess the germ of a perfect system of succession,' (he speaks now of property of every description,) with reference to our own constitution and habits. Its benefits, however, cannot be developed, till the present perplexed mode of administering assets, with their distinction of legal and equitable, their consequent marshalling, and the limited and circuitous liability of lands are removed. Justice, too, will not be done to the next of kin, until the executorship is treated as a mere office, and not as passing the residue, where undisposed of, to a stranger, in preference to the next of kin. Courts of equity have long revolted at this rule of law; and have, as usual, corrected it, whenever the individual case afforded evidence of intention to treat the executor as a trustee, by giving him a legacy, or, in the case of a bequest of the residue, which afterwards lapsed, by the legatee's death in the testator's lifetime. Here, however, as in many similar cases already noticed, the relief dispensed in particular instances is greatly diminished, if not counterbalanced, by the increase of judicial equity, and equitable distinctions,

We shall not travel step by step through the remaining divisions of the proposed code, but remark only such suggestions as arrest our attention by their apparent novelty or importance.

Under the head of rights arising out of the relation of marriage, the author proposes to give to the surviving husband, in case of issue, the rents and profits only of one moiety of the wife's land during his life; in case of no issue, a life estate in the land itself; to the surviving wife, in the former event, a third part-in the latter, a moiety of the rents and profits of whatever land the husband may die possessed of; and he vindicates the distinction by observing, that the issue is the first object of a deceased parent's duty and affection, and that the ties of collateral relationship are comparatively feeble. The restriction of the right of dower to whatever lands the husband may die possessed of, he defendsby the right of alienation, which should be inherent in a husband over his own property-by the brevity and simplification in the forms of conveyancing, which are in use to elude the present law of dower-and by the precedent of freebench, which, according to the usual custom of copyholds, attaches, in such lands only as the tenant may die possessed of. His reason for giving, in some instances, a share of the profits of the land, and, in others, the land itself, is in conformity with his general system, that the land should be left in the hands of the persons most interested in the good management of it. To avoid the present circuitous and

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modifications of real property in this country are so clearly and accurately delineated."

In the Second Part of his work, Mr. Humphreys treats Or THE REMEDY FOR THE DEFECTIVE STATE OF THE LAWS OF REAL PROPERTY.

There are two modes (he says) of effecting this-one, by applying partial remedies wherever the institutions are inconsistent or deficient; the other, by framing an entire new code of laws of real property.'

Mr. Humphreys introduces his own view of this momentous question by some apt citations from Lord Bacon's treatise De Augmentis Scientiarum, Lib. viii.

'There are two modes,' says Lord Bacon in his fifty-fourth aphorism, ' of enacting new statutes; one confirms and strengthens the former statutes upon the same subject, with some additions and variations; the other abrogates and expunges all former enactments, and substitutes an entirely new and uniform law. The latter appears to us preferable. The former renders the provisions complicated and perplexed; it provides a remedy for the case which presses, but vitiates the general body of the law: the latter requires greater deliberation in framing the enactment; but excellently provides for the future uniformity of the laws.' And again in his fifty-ninth aphorism:

If heaps on heaps of law have swelled into so many volumes, or labour under such confusion that it is become necessary to reduce them into a healthy and active body, let this be a paramount concern; let it be considered an heroic work; and the authors of such a work should be solemnly and deservedly numbered among the legislators, among the founders of society."

So in the seventy-eighth :

'Nothing contributes to the certainty of law so much as confining writings of authority within certain bounds, and keeping off an enormous multitude of legal authors and doctors. By these the doctrine of the law is frittered away; legal process becomes perpetual; advocates, from their inability to read and master the works themselves, have recourse to abridgments and glosses, tolerably executed perhaps. A few writers of acknowledged weight, or rather some portions of their writings, are adopted as authority.'

This, be it remembered, was written at a time when the English lawyer's library did not amount to a twentieth part of its present portentous dimensions; and Mr. Humphreys has done well to fortify his own decided preference of an entire new code of laws for the regulation of landed property, over any plan for the adhibition of partial remedies, by the sanction of a name so high and venerable. His next appeal is, to the examples set before us by several among the continental nations; Here the Code Napoleon necessarily occupies a pre-eminent station; This is followed by the payment of a high, and (we believe) a just, tribute of applause

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'heirs,' and the intentions of those who use it. If an ignorant person wishes to vest the absolute property of land in his devisee, he gives it to him without using the word heirs.' If he wishes to entail it upon him and his issue, he devises it to him and his heirs.' By the construction of law the devisee takes, in direct opposition to the intention of the testator, an estate for life only in the first instance, an estate in fee simple in the second. There has not, perhaps, been a single term for the last 100 years in which some case upon this point has not arisen: and the adoption of the proposed rule would undoubtedly obviate an infinity of litigation both at law and in equity.

To put the question within the reach of the public at large, the author urges, that the general term conveys the absolute and unqualified meaning, while, says the law maxim, additio probat minoritatem.

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Where,' observes old Wingate, (whom he quotes as commenting on this rule,) you finde it said in any book, that a man is seised in fee without saying more, it shall be understood in fee-simple; and not in fee-taile, unlesse there be put unto it such an addition, fee-taile, &c. and, therefore, in heraldry, the younger sonnes give the differences. And in France, by Monsieur, (without any addition or other title,) is to be understood the king's onely brother, and by Madame, (without more,) the king's onely sister; and, therefore, they are said in French to be Monsieur sans queue, and Madame sans queue, viz. without any other addition or title. But if there be in France any occasion of naming any other lord or lady, they are always named with their proper and peculiar title, as Monsieur de Longville, Madame de Chevreuse, &c.'

Surely, adds Mr. Humphreys, an absolute perpetuity may claim, with us, the privilege of passing sans queue.

On the great and much agitated subject of perpetuities, or (more strictly speaking) of the settlement of real property, by such limitations of it, as, during a certain period of time, will take it out of commerce, and suspend the vesting of the absolute ownership, Mr. Humphreys proposes, that land, or any profits accruing from it, may be aliened for the period of any life or lives in existence at the time of the deed being executed, or, (if the alienation be by will,) at the death of the testator-that it may also be aliened, either in possession, or so as to take effect on the death of the donor, or on the death of any tenant for life, to any person or class of persons, who may be living, or be conceived, when the disposition shall vest in possession; defeasible, however, on the death of the donee during infancy, or on any other assigned event within that limit. Substitutional limitations are next allowed under the same restrictions; but all dispositions, to take effect at any more remote period, are declared to be void.

The rules submitted by Mr. Humphreys for this purpose are

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represented by him as embodying and giving certainty and effect to the principles of our present laws of settlements, both as to lands and profits; and as remedial of the defects on this subject complained of in the first part of the essay. He adverts, however, to an useful effect indirectly produced by our present laws of settlement, of enabling a father, in consequence of the necessity for his concurrence in barring the entail by recovery, to procure a resettlement of the estate, and thus preserve it in the family. This power, he suggests, need not be relinquished; and for preserving it he proposes that, during the father's life, the eldest or only son's expectant estate shall not be alienable nor extendible, unless with the father's concurrence. This, in the event of the son's dying without issue in his father's lifetime, would give the property, on the son's death, to the brothers and sisters in the character of heirs.

These provisions would certainly be a great simplification of the present mode of settlement of real property. Years of study are required to comprehend it; and, when understood, none but the most skilful artists can be trusted with it. Even yet its principles are far from being distinctly settled; and their extent and application are still less ascertained. Hence great expense and litigation frequently follow, and legal instruments are immeasurably prolix; numerous contingencies must be provided for, and language sinks under the necessity of describing and providing for them. It is always extremely difficult, and often quite impossible to explain to the parties themselves the effect and operation of the settlements they execute, or the effect of their wills. Does one testator in fifty, when he devises his property in strict settlement, clearly know to whom, or in what manner, he has disposed of it?

The necessity (or at least the policy) has been long acknowledged in practice, of investing owners of limited interests in real property with certain powers, (as of selling, exchanging, and leasing,) which are now actually incident only to the absolute ownership. These incidents, now almost invariably given by express provision, Mr. Humphreys proposes to annex by law, to the partial estates in question-the two first to be made exerciseable at the instance of all tenants for life in possession, with remainder to their issue; the latter by the parties themselves being in actual possession. To this annexation of the power leasing we can discover no sound objection; but the mode of rendering those of sale and exchange available appears to us to demand the author's further consideration.

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All Charges on land are either in respect of some annual payments, or for securing a principal sum of money. Charges of

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