7. What were base services ?-61.

Such as were fit on.y for peasants, or persons of a servile rank; as, to plow the lord's land, to make his hedges, to carry out his dung, or other mean employments.

8. What were certain services ?-61.

The certain services, whether free or base, were such as were stinted in quantity, and could not be exceeded on any pretence; as to pay a stated annual rent, or to plow such a field for three days.

9. What were the uncertain services?—61.

They depended upon unknown contingencies; as to do military service in person, or pay an assessment in lieu of it, when called upon; or to wind a horn whenever the Scots invaded the realm; which are free services or to do whatever the lord should command, which is a base or villein service.

10. What, according to Bracton, were the four principal kinds of lay tenure?—61, 62.

First, tenure in chivalry per servitium militare, or by knight-service. Second, liberum socagium, or free socage, where the service was not only free, but also certain, as by fealty, &c. Third, purum villenagium, absolute or pure villenage, where the service was base in its nature, and uncertain as to time and quantity. Fourth, villenagium privilegiatum, or privileged villenage; where the service was base in its nature, but reduced to a certainty.

11. What constituted tenure by knight-service?—62.

It differed in very few points from a pure and proper feud, being entirely military, and the genuine effects of the feodal establishment in England: to make a tenure by knight-service a determinate quantity of land was necessary, which was called a knight's fee, feodum militare.

12. What was the reditus of the tenant by knight-service ?-62. He was bound to attend his lord to the wars, for forty days in every year, if called upon, as his reditus, rent, or service, for the land he claimed to hold.

13. What were the incidents to knight-service ?-63.

Knight-service drew after it these seven fruits and consequences, as inseparably incident to the title in chivalry; viz., aids, reliefs, primer seizin, wardship, marriage, fines for alienation, and escheat all these are of feodal original.

14. What were the aids granted by the tenant?—63.

They were principally three; First, to ransom the lord's person, if taken prisoner; secondly, to make the lord's eldest son a knight; thirdly, to marry the lord's eldest daughter, by giving her a suitable portion.

15. What were reliefs?—65.

Relief, relevium, was incident to every feodal tenure, by way of fine or composition with the lord for taking up the estate which was lapsed, or fallen in, by the death of the last tenant

16. What was primer seizin ?—66.

It was a feodal burden, only incident to the king's tenants in capite, and not to those who held of inferior or mesne lords. It was a right which the king had, when any of his tenants in capite died seized of a knight's fee, to receive of the heir (provided he were of full age) one whole year's profits of the lands, if they were in immediate possession; and half a year's profits, if the lands were in reversion expectant on an estate for life.

17. What was wardship?-67.

If the heir was under the age of twenty-one, being a mate, or fourteen, being a female, the lord was entitled to the wardship of the heir, and was called the guardian in chivalry. It consisted in having the custody of the body and lands of such heir, without any account of the profits, till the age of twenty-one in males, and sixteen in females.

18. When the heir came of full age was he obliged to receive knighthood?-69.

Yes; provided he held a knight's fee in capite, he was com pellable to take knighthood, or else pay a fine to the king.

19. What were fines upon alienation ?—71.

They were fines due to the lord for every alienation, whenever the tenant had occasion to make over his land to another.

20. What was attornment ?-72.

The lord could not alienate his seignory without the consent. of the tenant, which consent was called an attornment.

21. What was an escheat?—72.

The last consequence of tenure in chivalry was escheat, which is the determination of the tenure, or dissolution of the mutual bond between the lord and tenant, from the extinction of the blood of the latter by either natural or civil means. 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 feodal donation.

22. What was tenure by grand serjeanty, per magnum servitium?

-73.

That 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.

23. What was tenure by cornage ?—74.

It was to wind a horn when the Scots or other enemies en

tered the land, in order to warn the king's subjects It was a species of grand serjeanty.

24. What was escuage?—74.

Personal attendance in knight-service growing troublesome, the tenants found means of compounding for it, by making a pecuniary satisfaction in lieu of it. This 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 and also escuage.

25. What does magna charta say of escuage?—74.

That no scutage should be imposed without consent of parliament.

26. By what means were the advantages of the feodal constitution destroyed?-75.

By the degenerating of knight-service, or personal military duty, into escuage, or pecuniary assessments.

27. What became of military tenures ?—77.

They were destroyed, at one blow, by the statute 2 Car II., c. 24; and all sorts of tenures, held of the king or others, were thereby turned into free and common socage; save only tenures in frankalmoign, copyholds, and the honorary services of grand serjeanty.

28. What is said of this statute ?—77.

That it was a greater acquisition to the civil property of the kingdom than even magna charta itself.

CHAPTER VI.

OF THE MODERN ENGLISH TENURES.

1. What is socage tenure?-79.

Socage, in its most general and extensive signification, seems to denote a tenure by any certain and determinate service.

2. Does it still subsist ?-79.

Yes; it not only subsists to this day, but has in a manner absorbed and swallowed up, since the statute of Charles the Second, almost every other species of tenure.

3. Of chat sorts is socage ?—79.

Free and villein: free socage, where the services are not only certain but honorable; and villein socage, where the services, though certain, are of a baser nature.

4. What is the etymology of the word?-80, 81.

It is derived 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.

5. What is the origin of socage tenure ?-81-83.

It seems probable that the socage tenures were the relics of Saxon liberty. Gavelkind, which prevails in Kent, is generally acknowledged to be a species of socage tenure, the preservation whereof is a fact universally known.

6. Since the certainty of its services is the criterion of socage, what does this species of tenure include ?-81.

It includes under it all other methods of holding free lands, by certain and invariable rents and duties, and in particular, petit sergeanty, tenure in burgage, and gavelkind.

7. What is petit sergeanty?-82.

As defined by Littleton, it 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. It bears a great resemblance to grand sergeanty; 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

8. What is tenure in burgage ?-82.

It is a kind of town socage, where houses, or lands which were formerly the sites of houses in an ancient borough, are held of some lord, in common socage, by a certain established rent.

9. What is the custom of Borough English ?-83.

That the youngest son, and not the eldest, succeeds to the burgage tenement on the death of his father.

10. What are the distinguishing properties of gavelkind ?-84, 85. 1. The tenant is of age sufficient to alien his estate by teoffment at the age of fifteen. 2. The estate does not escheat in case of an attainder and execution for felony. 3. In most places the tenant had the power of devising lands, by will, before the statute for that purpose was made. 4. The lands descend to all the sons together.