the estate goes amongst all the daughters equally ; but in the case 

 of customaryholds, the estate goes to the eldest daughter, to the 

 exclusion of her younger sisters. 



These may be considered the distinguishing characteristics of 

 the tenure, but in addition there are peculiarities as to the method 

 of conveyance ; there are small annual rents payable to the lord of 

 the manor, and certain payments to be made on the death of the 

 lord or" the tenant, and my object to-night is to endeavour to trace 

 how these peculiarities arose, and how it is that they have been 

 preserved intact up to the present time. In order to do this, I 

 shall have to go back to the time of the Norman Conquest and 

 the old system of feudal tenure. With the exception of a few 

 isolated cases, such as the case of Westmorland, the whole of the 

 lands in England may, roughly speaking, be considered as being 

 either freehold or copyhold. Their origin is distinctly traceable, 

 and dates from the Norman Conquest. 



As soon as the Normans obtained possession of this country, 

 much land was without any owner, as they had killed many of the 

 original owners of the land, or driven them from their estates. 

 The king accordingly rewarded his more conspicuous followers by 

 grants of the land so left without an owner. These grants were 

 originally of considerable extent, and were chiefly given to the 

 nobles about the court, or to those who held high rank in the army. 

 They, having neither leisure nor inclination for a pastoral life, did 

 not attempt themselves to bring the land into cultivation, but 

 retained a dwelling-house and a considerable tract of land in their 

 own hands. They allotted out other portions to farmers, on 

 condition of their keeping their lord's land in cultivation, and the 

 remainder was allowed to be common land for the joint feeding of 

 the flocks of both the lord and his tenants. The land retained in 

 hand by the lords being subject to no services except a nominal 

 duty of homage and fealty to the king, became freehold, and was 

 conveyed as freehold from hand to hand by mere delivery of posses- 

 sion. The land kept by the tenants gradually by custom was 

 allowed to pass from father to son, or from the tenant to a 

 purchaser from him, until a right to convey the property grew up, 



