192 



MAXIMS OF THE LA\V. 



Therefore if a party menace me, except I make unto him 

 a bond of forty pounds, and I tell him that I will not do it, 

 but I will make unto him a bond of twenty pounds, the law 

 shall not expound this bond to be voluntary, but shall 

 rather make construction that my mind and courage is not 

 to enter into the greater bond for any menace, and yet that 

 I enter by compulsion notwithstanding into the lesser. 



But if I will draw any consideration to myself, as if I had 

 said, I will enter into your bond of forty pounds, if you will 

 deliver me that piece of plate, now the duresse is discharged ; 

 and yet if it had been moved from the duressor, who had 

 said at the first, You shall take this piece of plate, and 

 make me a bond of forty pounds, now the gift of the plate 

 had been good, and yet the bond shall be avoided by 

 duresse. 



REGULA XXIII. 



Ambiguitas verborum latens verificatione suppletur ; nam 

 quod ex facto oritur ambiguum verificatione facti tollitur. 



THERE be two sorts of ambiguities of words, the one is 

 ambiguitas patens, and the other latens. Patens is that 

 which appears to be ambiguous upon the deed or instru 

 ment; latens is that which seemeth certain and without 

 ambiguity, for any thing that appeareth upon the deed or 

 instrument ; but there is some collateral matter out of the 

 deed that breedeth the ambiguity. 



Ambiguitas patens is never holpen by averment, and the 

 reason is, because the law will not couple and mingle mat 

 ter of specialty, which is of the higher account, with mat 

 ter of averment, which is of inferior account in law; for 

 that were to make all deeds hollow, and subject to aver 

 ments, and so in effect, that to pass without deed, which 

 the law appointeth shall not pass but by deed. 



Therefore if a man give land to /. D. et I. S. et h&redibus, 

 and do not limit to whether of their heirs, it shall not be 

 supplied by averment to whether of them the intention was 

 the inheritance should be limited. 



So if a man give land in tail, though it be by will, the 

 remainder in tail, and add a proviso in this manner : Pro 

 vided that if he, or they, or any of them do any, &c. accord 

 ing to the usual clauses of perpetuities, it cannot be averred 

 upon the ambiguities of the reference of this clause, that 

 the intent of the devisor was, that the restraint should go 

 only to him in the remainder, and the heirs of his body; 



